Some Posts Are Fractal, or, It's Foreshadowing And Characterisation All the Way Down

[elisem]

So I just clicked over to Jeremy's goofing up the private message on an Order Only post, and reading through it reminded me how very many things get done at once in a lot of Alternity posts. (I know I'm talking about my own character, but it happens in every character's timeline.) In this one post, early in Jeremy's played time, there's:

* foreshadowing for the working relationship Bill and Jeremy have (which will eventually lead to Jeremy asking Bill to be best man when Jeremy and Maureen finally wed)
* an example of how the ISS group pools info to figure out what the grownups are not telling them
* Kingsley's guidance, and why he is so very much missed
* Sally-Anne, Pansy and Ron talking over interpersonal dynamics with an eye to future trouble and calculating the risk thereof
* Jeremy demonstrating his unexamined cluelessness about emotional impact by using the word squib as a self-putdown -- in front of Alice, while everyone is waiting to see if Frank has lost his magic for good. (This cluelessness about emotional impact will flower when he offers Hermione Teddy Nott's wand as a trophy and working tool.)
* showing how Remus/Sirius/Alice/Molly look after one another in times of stress and worry
* good early example of how Sally-Anne and Jeremy chat and banter (Sally-Anne telling him " I just lack the commitment to science and data-gathering that some Ravenclaws have, which is probably why the Hat put me in Slytherin.")

... and probably more. One of the things I love about Alternity is how interwoven all the pieces wound up being, and how not only the playing advanced the narrative, but how many directions it so often advanced the narrative at once.

Got any examples of fractal posts that you liked a lot? Pivotal ones? Or just things where the interplay and worldbuilding delighted you?

Comments

[synecdochic]

I had so much fun writing that. I don't remember if I knew at that point that Snape would be dying in the Battle of Hogwarts -- I think I might have, but even if I hadn't, I knew it would be coming soon. (The "I confess I am looking forward to seeing those things built" was soooo painful.)

(I also love "And I suppose I love you too, you meddlesome beast", from that same thread, because that's Snape for "you are one of my dearest friends and I love you fiercely", and by that point Alice knows enough about him to know that.)

But yes! Snape cared deeply about Nev. In canon, I think it wasn't just that he saw Neville as someone who should have been the Boy-Who-Lived so Lily didn't have to die; part of it was that he only interacted with Neville in Potions class, and I talked elsewhere about how much Snape hated teaching beginners and people who couldn't keep up with him, and he saw Neville as not caring/not making the effort, which infuriated him. (Also, it didn't help that he had to be on edge all the time watching Neville's every move to prevent an incredibly dangerous explosion!)

In Alternity, Snape was still Neville's teacher, but at a subject (Occlumency) that Neville was a) highly, highly motivated to learn and b) fairly decent at. Seeing Neville working so hard at it short-circuited a lot of that frustration.

[lucky_guess]

...I've read that quote twice in the last two days (once on the full thread, once just now), and both times, it's made me cry. FYI. (Cried buckets and buckets the first time it was being written, too!)