• An addendum to Rule 3 regarding fan-translated works of things such as Web Novels has been made. Please see here for details.
  • We've issued a clarification on our policy on AI-generated work.
  • Our mod selection process has completed. Please welcome our new moderators.
  • Due to issues with external spam filters, QQ is currently unable to send any mail to Microsoft E-mail addresses. This includes any account at live.com, hotmail.com or msn.com. Signing up to the forum with one of these addresses will result in your verification E-mail never arriving. For best results, please use a different E-mail provider for your QQ address.
  • For prospective new members, a word of warning: don't use common names like Dennis, Simon, or Kenny if you decide to create an account. Spammers have used them all before you and gotten those names flagged in the anti-spam databases. Your account registration will be rejected because of it.
  • Since it has happened MULTIPLE times now, I want to be very clear about this. You do not get to abandon an account and create a new one. You do not get to pass an account to someone else and create a new one. If you do so anyway, you will be banned for creating sockpuppets.
  • Due to the actions of particularly persistent spammers and trolls, we will be banning disposable email addresses from today onward.
  • The rules regarding NSFW links have been updated. See here for details.

Hostage Situation [Worm AU fanfic]

Reader mode
Ack said:
Amy looked down at Aster who was now peacefully dozing, the bottle discarded to the side. She imagined the baby's distress if she were to be suddenly separated from her mother, never to see her again. It was a scenario that cut a little close to home for her. Purity was known as a supervillain, but she was trying to become better than that. Dad's a supervillain too, and he's willing to walk away from that life for my sake.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Amy could actually help with this fairly easily. It would be just a matter of changing Aster's paternal DNA for everything other than her brain. Then all Kayden has to do is run a paternity test and say that Max isn't the father.

Problem solved legally.

Good chapter too.
 
Darkarma said:
Amy could actually help with this fairly easily. It would be just a matter of changing Aster's paternal DNA for everything other than her brain. Then all Kayden has to do is run a paternity test and say that Max isn't the father.

Problem solved legally.

Good chapter too.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
You honestly think Max doesn't have a clause buried somewhere in the pre-marital agreement where he can pull all sorts of shit if she's found to have committed adultery?

I wouldn't put it past him, even to the point of pulling out one where the ink's still tacky but it has her signature on it (thanks, Victor).

This is not a man who plays by any rules but the ones he sets up for his own benefit.
 
Ack said:
You honestly think Max doesn't have a clause buried somewhere in the pre-marital agreement where he can pull all sorts of shit if she's found to have committed adultery?

I wouldn't put it past him, even to the point of pulling out one where the ink's still tacky but it has her signature on it (thanks, Victor).

This is not a man who plays by any rules but the ones he sets up for his own benefit.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Fair enough. It would be a start though, especially if Amy or Kayden get someone sneaking to volunteer to be the father to assert their rights.
 
Last edited:
Darkarma said:
Fair enough. It would be a start though, especially if Amy or Kaydenget someone sneaking to volunteer to be the father to assert their rights.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It would take more than that. Paternity laws pre-date DNA testing, so Max would still legally be Aster's father because he was married to Kayden when she was born. Having a "real" father willing to take responsibility would help, but Max has enough resources and spite to make any attempt to terminate his parental rights a long, hard battle that he would have a decent chance of winning.
 
Zackarix said:
It would take more than that. Paternity laws pre-date DNA testing, so Max would still legally be Aster's father because he was married to Kayden when she was born. Having a "real" father willing to take responsibility would help, but Max has enough resources and spite to make any attempt to terminate his parental rights a long, hard battle that he would have a decent chance of winning.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Well, there's one very specific way to terminate his parental rights, that Marquis might be inclined toward.

Especially after he realised just how much of an asshole Kaiser was toward Kayden.

Just saying.
 
Ack said:
That scored a wince from Kayden. "I'm sorry about your aunt. That should never have happened."

"No." Amy had been too young when Fleur died to know her all that well, but the memory still raised a pang. "It shouldn't have." She wondered if the punk who'd done it—they'd tried him as a fucking minor, for fuck's sake—was still strutting his stuff in the Empire Eighty-Eight. Making himself out to be a big man, when all he'd done was kill an unmasked cape by surprise. Or had he spoken out of turn to the wrong guy, and ended up in a shallow grave? She guessed she'd never know.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Didn't Kaiser literally publicly crucify the guy who killed fleur? Before he could get caught and tried by the heroes?
 
edale said:
Didn't Kaiser literally publicly crucify the guy who killed fleur? Before he could get caught and tried by the heroes?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Wildbow addresses this in Ward, possibly to underscore the grimderp of canon.


The perp was a minor, who broke down during the trial and blubbered for his father.

Vicky thought at the time that he'd never get into the Empire after showing that level of weakness.

She was wrong. They welcomed him with open arms after he finished his abbreviated sentence (minor, remember).
 
Ack said:
Wildbow addresses this in Ward, possibly to underscore the grimderp of canon.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
This is one that I'm okay with TBH. There are many good ways to make the Wormverse less universally terrible, but whitewashing literal Nazis is not one of them. (And it wasn't even from W**d originally. It was just repeated there for visibility.)
 
Ack said:
Wildbow addresses this in Ward, possibly to underscore the grimderp of canon.


The perp was a minor, who broke down during the trial and blubbered for his father.

Vicky thought at the time that he'd never get into the Empire after showing that level of weakness.

She was wrong. They welcomed him with open arms after he finished his abbreviated sentence (minor, remember).
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Wait, so the crucifixion was fanon? Coulda sworn that was canon...
 
Damn, that's a disappointment. I don't care what people say - I liked the fact that life was brutal and cheap in Worm, and I liked that the villains actually acted like villains. In the army of Genghis Khan, you could get the death penalty for not picking up a dropped bowstring a member of your squad had let slip from his pack, and committing crimes that actually reflected negatively on your leadership would earn you long, lingering torture before death. I'd think that a man as keen on creating both a good image of himself and on maintaining absolute control on everything around him as Max Anders would totally torture a follower who made him look bad to death.

I think the fanon about the fate of Fleur's killer was fine. I don't know why Wildbow would want to replace such a fun and nasty character moment for Kaiser with something so relatively milquetoast, unless he thought it somehow glorified Nazism or something.
 
Scopas said:
Damn, that's a disappointment. I don't care what people say - I liked the fact that life was brutal and cheap in Worm, and I liked that the villains actually acted like villains. In the army of Genghis Khan, you could get the death penalty for not picking up a dropped bowstring a member of your squad had let slip from his pack, and committing crimes that actually reflected negatively on your leadership would earn you long, lingering torture before death. I'd think that a man as keen on creating both a good image of himself and on maintaining absolute control on everything around him as Max Anders would totally torture a follower who made him look bad to death.

I think the fanon about the fate of Fleur's killer was fine. I don't know why Wildbow would want to replace such a fun and nasty character moment for Kaiser with something so relatively milquetoast, unless he thought it somehow glorified Nazism or something.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Given his POV characters in Ward, are you shocked he'd do something to increase the conga line of shit she'd get?
 
Wasn't Fleur's murderer being an E88 wannabe also originally fanon? If so, it seems like another attempt to subvert a fanon idea. The more I hear about Ward, the more I understand why some people think it was a deliberate "Take that!" at fanfic tropes.
 
Scopas said:
That's a very fair point. I wonder if Wildbow actually hates his protagonists, because a bunch of the suffering they endure seems almost petty while remaining implacably cruel.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It's one of the reasons I and others consider Worm to be a grimderp story, even if the setting is less so (the distinction between story and setting is important in this context).
 
Prince Charon said:
It's one of the reasons I and others consider Worm to be a grimderp story, even if the setting is less so (the distinction between story and setting is important in this context).
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Yeah, there's definitely a fair criticism there, but I don't think it's confined to Worm. I haven't read Twig or Pale, but I did read Pact, and I remember thinking that the poor bastard had gotten fucked even harder than Taylor by Wildbow. It was a situation that just went from bad to worse, to much worse. I don't think that guy had a single positive moment throughout the entire book, except possibly when he met the bird-ghost familiar.
 
Zackarix said:
Wasn't Fleur's murderer being an E88 wannabe also originally fanon? If so, it seems like another attempt to subvert a fanon idea. The more I hear about Ward, the more I understand why some people think it was a deliberate "Take that!" at fanfic tropes.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I have heard from a number of people that Wildbow has a history of doing things like that.
 
Zackarix said:
Wasn't Fleur's murderer being an E88 wannabe also originally fanon? If so, it seems like another attempt to subvert a fanon idea. The more I hear about Ward, the more I understand why some people think it was a deliberate "Take that!" at fanfic tropes.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Pretty sure it was always the case. Then someone started the fanon that Kaiser crucified the guy, and WB went, "Nope. He let him in just fine."

Chaospawn said:
I have heard from a number of people that Wildbow has a history of doing things like that.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I understand he's retconning Worm to make Amy less relatable and more of an evil beeyatch from the start.
 
I can't really blame Wildbow for disliking fanon, heaven knows fans have some bad takes, but if that's the case he should ignore fanfic communities (he should probably be doing that anyway) instead of filling his work with spite. "You read my Jerkass Woobie as more Woobie than Jerkass? Wrong, she's actually a complete monster and rapist." "You thought Kaiser would ever put on a show of caring about the unwritten rules? Wrong, he'd actively and publicly reward breaking them." I don't mind ignoring fanon but it should be because the author has his own ideas, not because he hates the fanfic community that keeps his fanbase active.
 
Zackarix said:
I can't really blame Wildbow for disliking fanon, heaven knows fans have some bad takes, but if that's the case he should ignore fanfic communities (he should probably be doing that anyway) instead of filling his work with spite.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Among Fandom I don't think Worm fans are anywhere as bad as some of the other fans.
It not in a perpetual Civil War like the Star Wars fandom.
It not trying to get people to comment suicide for doing fanart or art of a certain ship like Steven Universe fandom.
Or send out death threat to the creators to get them to make their slash ship made Canon, I forgot which fandom did that one but I imagine their were a number of them that did that.
 
Zackarix said:
I can't really blame Wildbow for disliking fanon, heaven knows fans have some bad takes, but if that's the case he should ignore fanfic communities (he should probably be doing that anyway) instead of filling his work with spite. "You read my Jerkass Woobie as more Woobie than Jerkass? Wrong, she's actually a complete monster and rapist." "You thought Kaiser would ever put on a show of caring about the unwritten rules? Wrong, he'd actively and publicly reward breaking them." I don't mind ignoring fanon but it should be because the author has his own ideas, not because he hates the fanfic community that keeps his fanbase active.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Also, the whole ambiguous answers to genuine questions irritates the crap out of me.

Contrast u/Ralts_Bloodthorne, who's writing the intensely insane First Contact story over on Reddit. He's been doing it since about February/March, and the chapter and word count are amazing. He engages fully with his fanbase and has canonised about three or four omakes which I've written about the story.

Also, he doesn't hate his characters. The bad ones sometimes get redemption, while the irredeemable ones get what's coming to them. The heroes get to be Big Damn Heroes. One will occasionally go out in a blaze of glory, but they get the recognition that's coming to them.

If you haven't already, go check it out. It starts slowly, but gradually builds up steam. Be aware: pop culture references abound, as do onion ninjas.

P'thok Eats An Ice Cream Cone.
 
I fucking love First Contact! It's so wonderful to have consistent quality updates of a story, and he does such a good job of both keeping the stakes high while not making everybody traumatized by his more hardcore chapters.

My 600k+ karma account got perma-suspended from Reddit, but I still follow the story as a guest. I think it's actually better than the Jenkinsverse, certainly better than the fandom extras as opposed to just the main writer's stuff. I think it might be the greatest piece of Reddit fiction available.

Also, are you the same Ack that does the close-readings of each chapter? If so, I really like your comments. As soon as I read an update, I scroll-down to read your chapter breakdowns - they're frequently entertaining and sometimes informative.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Ack
Scopas said:
I fucking love First Contact! It's so wonderful to have consistent quality updates of a story, and he does such a good job of both keeping the stakes high while not making everybody traumatized by his more hardcore chapters.

My 600k+ karma account got perma-suspended from Reddit, but I still follow the story as a guest. I think it's actually better than the Jenkinsverse, certainly better than the fandom extras as opposed to just the main writer's stuff. I think it might be the greatest piece of Reddit fiction available.

Also, are you the same Ack that does the close-readings of each chapter? If so, I really like your comments. As soon as I read an update, I scroll-down to read your chapter breakdowns - they're frequently entertaining and sometimes informative.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
That is indeed me. I like to put my own spin on the little nuggets of information he slips in there, and he says he likes me doing it too.
 
Zackarix said:
Wasn't Fleur's murderer being an E88 wannabe also originally fanon? If so, it seems like another attempt to subvert a fanon idea. The more I hear about Ward, the more I understand why some people think it was a deliberate "Take that!" at fanfic tropes.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It was WoG, not fanon; Fleur's page on the Worm wiki had an edit by Wildbow which mentioned it. The crucifixion thing is totally fanon, though.
 
Reader mode
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)
Back
Top