Davide

Things worked out for Chi-Chi, thankfully, but the conversation about which medical things work for a different species was an interesting point. Waiting was the right decision, Rhaelce was right that there was a risk of Chi-Chi pushing herself too much if they had left earlier. I like that Aleela was depicted as an actual 12 year old, with the Old Town Funk dance and the sweets, sometimes writers forget to make their actions age appropriate. There was a lot of progress between Malik and Rhaelce. That fight was intense, fuelled by Malik's fury, but it led to a needed conversation. Malik felt bad because he liked the fight, but Rhaelce made the important point that this isn't bad because it was a fight to protect people. And things between the two of them are good enough that they were going to have sex, Malik didn't pull away. But Chic-Chi cockblocked them, damn you, Cassie. The conversation about what happens after the mountains was the most interesting part. Rhaelce can't go back to him family, and it makes sense that he'd want to see more of his world now that he saw how much more exists that's different from what he knew. Of course Malik used to want to return home, but now he realises there's almost nothing left there for him. But here he has Rhaelce, and they seem to have feelings for each other, it's not just physical.

This chapter points more towards queen of blue balling the readers.

We've previously seen Aleela do watch duty together with Kalloh, because she wanted to participate and no one was going to have a 12 year old do it alone. So I assume the same thing was happening when she came saying "They are in the trees" in Swahili (thank you, Google), which makes me suspicious of Kalloh. He was gone at the same time as the attack was about to start, instead of warning the group, and only showed up when they were starting to fight. But maybe I'm just paranoid, we'll see. We got an upgrade in the Malik's firebending, he was able to pull fire from 10 feet away. But that's nothing compared to the upgrade in Aleela's earthbending, she was able to cause a freaking earthquake. Holy shit!

I like that things between the Malik and Rhaelce didn't magically go back to how they were before quickly, it's a lot more realistic for it to take some time. But they have been progressing in important ways. Rhaelce saw theMalik firebending and didn't freak out. It's one thing to accept it in theory and another to see it in practice. He doesn't understand it, but he doesn't have to, what's important is he accepts it. The Malik accepted returning to fighting with Rhaelce. Sure, Aleela was the reason, but he still did it. And that's meaningful because it's how they initially bonded. Finally, they cleared the misunderstanding, with explanations of both the importance of the amocava custom for the tailies and process to get redemption from our human ways.

RHAELCE! I feel The Malik's pain early in the chapter when he thinks about how the remaining four people in the group are in pairs of people who are close to each other, while he doesn't have the person he was close with. Then Rhaelce returns and I'm relieved he did, but of course things don't return to what they were like immediately. I like that Chi-Chi's objection is based on not wanting The Malik to hurt again as much as he did the first time. But I'm glad the group accepted him, although the flimsy majority can make things a bit tense. Rhaelce leaving hurt The Malik, that can't be undone with a simple apology. It requires time and him proving that he changed, that he accepts The Malik as he is, with his powers. I'm glad The Malik told Rhaelce the truth that he didn't have powers on Earth, honesty is important, even if it can Rhaelce more weary. The amocava situation is an unfortunate misunderstanding between different cultures, but thankfully Rhaelce realised this. My guess is it will take seeing Rhaelce's reaction to The Malik using his powers for good for them to trust him again.

In this chapter, Cassie somehow decided she hadn't yet made things hard enough for herself, so she added a character that can only communicate in a specific way and yet another new language. Although at least this one isn't a fictional language, the main language of Tanzania is Swahili according to Google. And Aleela's word, "asante", at the end of the chapter, means "thank you". The Malik seems to already trust Aleela, but not Kalloh, which are the reactions I'd expect towards a 12 year old and a mind reader. From my reader point of view, I believe Kalloh when they say they can only read the thoughts pertinent to the conversation, but I'd be worried about them hiding the ability to read more if I was on The Malik's position. We have fire, water and earth powers coming from character from different parts of Earth. That obviously makes us expect someone with air powers and, judging from where these three characters are from, I'd bet on a potentially fourth one being from Latin America.

The Malik (I figured I'd join the bandwagon on calling him that) thinks that he probably shouldn't have fought those guys, but I'm not so sure. They may have come after him again if he had run. Him holding his own, despite the injuries, may have kept them away. But now traveling will be harder for him in this state. The Malik and Chi-Chi had a bonding moment, but it seems clear that both of them can only control one element. As expected, you can't make the protagonists OP. I'm curious about how they gain these abilities, it would appear maybe traveling on those machines did it. But I don't know why.

Malik keeps losing people, by them dying, them leaving him or him being separated from them, and that has to take a toll. He lost his father a long time ago, he effectively lost his mother at the same time in the sense of her caring about him, he lost his friends without knowing if it will forever when he got sent to this world, he lost Naivres who he cared about after the time he spent with that family, he lost most of the rest of that family when they blamed him for her death, plus now he lost Rhaelce and this one is particularly hard because he had feelings for him. So of course this time is difficult for Malik. But it may actually be worse for Rhaelce. He seemed to also have feelings for Malik and he found out something that makes him think Malik is dangerous. If Malik had actively done something awful, maybe that could help Rhaelce move on from him, but he didn't. Malik allegedly being dangerous means Rhaelce needs to stay away from him, but it doesn't stop the feelings. And, unlike Malik, Rhaelce has to deal with it alone, which means more time dwelling on those thoughts. As for Malik wanting to give him a chance to return, Rhaelce can track them without them noticing him if he wants to, he has the skills.

That nightmare was awful, damn. Malik's stepfather sucks, I can see why he needed places to hide. And the homophobic part of it has a bigger impact now than when it happened because, unless I'm misremembering, Malik thought he was straight until he met Rhaelce. And then the Naivres part is difficult for a different reason, because it means he feels guilty for her death. It's common to fall into thoughts like "If I hadn't done this, she might have been alive", but that doesn't imply guilt since nothing he did was wrong. We later get Rhaelce's perspective on her death and he makes a good point. Sometimes people want, often subconsciously, something concrete to blame to help deal with the grief. Malik provides that for Naivres, while the vagueness the Unspoken, which they can't retaliate against, doesn't. Rhaelce went in a different direction, he wants to travel to hunt those creatures, which means they're no longer a vague threat, they're something he can pursue. Traveling in a group is proving useful, because Chihiro is right about needing to prepare for the cold and the plan to achieve that seems good. If Malik had been traveling alone with Rhaelce, they'd have probably ended up continuing unprepared for the weather. It's good to see the group trusting each other more, as evidenced by them teaching each other their fighting styles. Malik and Rhaelce are also getting closer, judging by the kisses, that's good.

I already read until the end of book 1 a while ago, but I fell back on commenting because I was busy. It took me too long, but I'm finally coming back to comment and I will ignore what I know about the remaining chapters while I do it. Malik and Rhaelce met new characters and a group of people from different places who don't yet trust each other can create an interesting dynamic. For Malik, finding someone from Earth who speaks English must feel really good. Chihiro has a similar story to Malik regarding how she ended up in this world, although hers in scarier. That creates the question of why are there hidden portals to this world in different parts of Earth, who put them there and why? I assume there are more than just these two and they're in abandoned places to keep them hidden. Malik and Rhaelce not yet trusting Chihiro and Shuza is prudent, but I don't think they mean any harm. And both pairs benefit from traveling together, they have different things to offer. Chihiro and Shuza have a crude map and more knowledge of the world, while Malik and Rhaelce can hunt and are skilled enough to feel like they can defend themselves in the forest. But communicating is difficult for Shuza and Rhaelce, and Cassie too, they have to go through a double translation made by people with limited knowledge of their languages. Chihiro said Shuza collects tales and news, but there's nothing from the north and he wants to know why. One possibility for that, like she said later, is the north being unexplored. But another possibility is that whoever goes to the north doesn't usually return and that's why stories from there don't make it to other regions. That makes traveling there sound hazardous, or maybe another word I'm not supposed to use yet.

Respect for GA that, they didn't just ban that person, they even contacted you about the plagiarism.

I learned that a story I was reading on Nifty was also being posted on a site with a comment section, this one. I like reading what people say about stories, so I started coming here to read the comments. That made me check out what other stories it has and I learned that it's significantly easier to find stories I'm interested in on GA than on Nifty. So I started reading stories, mostly old ones at the time, and created an account a few months later.

If a chapter is particularly interesting or is creating more conversation in the comments, I will open it more times to read the comments than I open other ones. If every click from the same account counts, that will increase the numbers in comparison to other chapters. In addition, if there's a longer wait between a pair of chapters than others, maybe more people reopen that chapter to check if they already read it or it's a new one, even though they could see that from the GA thingy that says what's the highest chapter we've read.

To give one extra piece of information, the new Stargate show was approved under one Amazon president and the plug was pulled after a change in president. So it was a matter of the new president having a different opinion. Personally, I think the reasoning doesn't make sense. The best way to get new fans to an existing property to get the original fans to like the new show, while not requiring a lot of background knowledge, and then hope those fans will introduce the show to new people.

I had given up on commenting, switching to just reading to be faster. But I have to connect the dots on Dylan and Brandon, since I don't see anyone else doing it in this chapter's comments. In chapter 4, Brandon saw Billy doing some stuff with Dylan at a cabin, which Dylan repeatedly insisted he's not gay. I don't think we knew Dylan was Devin's brother yet. Then, in chapter 11, Billy asked Brandon for advice in the bathroom. But this was right after Brandon and Tyler had an argument and weren't speaking to each other. So Brandon's thoughts in that moment, coloured by what happened with Tyler, was to find a new friend because hooking up with straight guys always ends with getting hurt. Now we learned Billy flat out stopped talking to Dylan and Brandon's bad advice is the reason. And that bad advice happened because, at that moment, he though Tyler was just another straight guy who made him fall for him and then left, leaving him hurt. So it all an unfortunate consequence of Billy asking for Brandon's advice precisely while he was dealing with with being hurt by a similar situation and before Brandon's situation ended up getting resolved, therefore proving that what he believed then was wrong. While this resulted in a whole mess, I don't blame Brandon, he said what he truly believed at the time and it was because he was hurt.