The Fan-fic Ideas and Advice Thread.

[BruTak]

Alternately he could ask them a simple question.

"What's the furthest you've ever travelled? The US? Australia?"

Then he shows them a picture of a guy in a spacesuit.

"This is Neil Armstrong. In July of 1969 he was the first man to walk on the moon."

[Skydiver]

Your character seems to be just as confident in his abilities as the wizards are. And, usually, confident people don’t indulge too much in ‘mine is bigger’ games. they may snipe and circle around each other sizing each other up, but the wizard would dismiss him as a stupid muggle, hunder would dismiss the wizard as a namby pampy wuss in robes.

Most of Lucius’ scenes were more bully bluster than real threats. draco the same. Frightened folks that bully to hide how afraid they are or that someone will find out just how normal they are.

Hunter strikes me as a person that would have this ‘I can kill you ten ways without trying so go away annoying gnat’ kind of arrogance. (You could also call it confidence)

I thought it was established that the ministry kinda kept their hands off of hogwarts....Hermoine aghast that Umbridge was there and her changes ‘it means the ministry is interfering at Hogwarts’, so would they have that much say in who was hired? Beyond the assurance that hte muggle would keep their world a secret.

We know that there were some wizards that lived in the muggle world. Like the older lady that was keeping an eye on Harry and some others. Just as we know that there are those like the Weasleys that lived far off the grid nd rarely interacted with them.

Hunter is your hero but you don’t want to mary sue him too much.

I would think a lot of the debate about Hunter would have happened before he was hired and behind his back. It would only come to the fore when the field trips are brought up or something happens to draw attention to him and his abilities.

[BruTak]

Hmm... Perhaps some more thought is required before anything is set in stone.

[Skydiver]

It’s your story nd you write it as you like.

My perspective is, well he’d be a bit like Jack O’Neill...not necessarily the wise cracks and such but quiet confidence.

Yes, they are movie or tv portrayals but my impression of special ops folks are not blustering show offs, but measured confidence. they’ve been trained to handle things and they handle them. Not that they dont’ get flustered or caught off guard or angry but they don’t seem to be about grandiose displays.

THink about Han Solo, he knew how to handle himself and played it cool most of the time. Luke , as he got older, also got the confidence thing going and the brashness faded. (different universe but examples of what I think your character would be)

Dumbledore handled himself with confidence. so did snape. they didn’t bluster and advertise, they just were.

Harry got to be that way towards the end.

Maybe i’m at a wrong POV here but I see your Hunter kinda looking down on the wizards for taking the easy way out all the time. And your wizards looking down on Hunter for being a muggle. There has to be an eventual mutual respect thing going for both sides to truly see each other and respect each other.

In some ways it seems to be an almost reverse Harry Potter....the books were a slow introduction to the magical world, how wonderful it was and then revealing the dark side. well humans already live with a lot of that dark side (Discrimination, predjudice, etc) and I’m sure hunter is very jaded with all he’s seen and done. He may eventually learn the wonder of magic, but also with an adult’s POV sees the inherent dark side as well.

[BruTak]

Hunter's been loitering in the "fan fic ideas" section of my brain for years.

His back story is he joined the military at 17 after the death of his parents. He was part of the rescue mission that sprung Jack O'Neill from an Iraqi PoW facility during the first Gulf War.

[Skydiver]

I have stories like that too. Ideas i’ve had but never been able to put them down on paper.

If I were writing it Id’ start with hunter showing up at the school. I”m presuming the teachers show up days/weeks before the term starts. He moves in and finds his way around. that;’s when it’s established that he’s a muggle. That some teachers accept him automatically, others not so much.

He’s half pitied, half detested. A normal ‘weak’ human. But an oddity because he doesn’t seem like a teacher. He’s confident, able to to take care of himself. some teachers can pick up on the sense of menace about him, it scares some, intrigues others. He has a attitude that they’re not always used to, a confidence that some aren’t used to.

He may also have a degree of disdain for magic that some pick up on. Maybe also a bit of mystery about him. Is he a squib? Where did he come from? How did he come to be at hogwarts?

when he teaches the kids there are issues. Why is he teaching them bout muggles and the muggle world?

To me it cn be just as much his relationship with the other teachers as students. He’s going to befriend someone or at least the relationships work to develop some mutual respect. they see him as more than a muggle, he realizes that magic isn’t just the easy way out.

Anyway, just thinking out loud.

[Princess Awinita]

Is this a private party or can anyone join in ?

If anyone can join in, heres my current seedling growing into a full on willowtree {With babies of its own!!!}

Namely, Why have we never seen or read a mystery story, at sea, a cruise liner stricken with a illness so severe thery dont risk alerting the mainland for 2 reasons, 1 the captain is scared someone on the ship set the virus afloat and doesnt want to alert them, and 2 even if he COULD get a notice to the mainland he cant due to signal static device shutting out all in and out communications

Alone at sea, four siblings and three of their friends for a two week cruise find them selves in a mystery after one of them contracts the illness but thanks to a doctor skilled with traditional chinerse medicines the seven friends have ot get to the bottom of the mystery....

Oh and the possible bad guy is named Mr Azul

[thekillman]

I have stories like that too. Ideas i’ve had but never been able to put them down on paper.

I could write a book about all the unfinished ideas i have, but that in itself would probably end up unfinished.

If I were writing it Id’ start with hunter showing up at the school. (...)But an oddity because he doesn’t seem like a teacher. He’s confident, able to to take care of himself. (...)He has a attitude that they’re not always used to, a confidence that some aren’t used to. (...) He may also have a degree of disdain for magic that some pick up on. Maybe also a bit of mystery about him. Is he a squib? Where did he come from? How did he come to be at hogwarts?

Yea this seems like the best approach. To someone like Hunter, magic would just be a tool like any other. Where normally muggles and squibs are mostly impressed or afraid of magic, Hunter would approach it with a casual attutide that would frustrate the proud wizards. If Hunter is confident he can take his opponent even if he's a wizard, then being threatened or bullied wouldn't impress him.

All in all, it seems to me that the culture conflict could be very interesting. Most muggles and squibs in HP so far have been citizens. What would a military man do? How would he deal with things? What would Wizards think of it? What would half-bloods think of it?

[thekillman]

Namely, Why have we never seen or read a mystery story, at sea, a cruise liner stricken with a illness so severe thery dont risk alerting the mainland for 2 reasons, 1 the captain is scared someone on the ship set the virus afloat and doesnt want to alert them, and 2 even if he COULD get a notice to the mainland he cant due to signal static device shutting out all in and out communications

The issue i think is that the biggest problem with disease is containment, and a ship is the ideal containment.

[BruTak]

I kind of feel Hunter would start with the basics.

He's got a small dish of a fine black powder on the desk in front of him. "This is gun powder. It is comprised of sulphur, saltpeter, and charcoal. This is what happens when you set light to it."

[BruTak]

The issue i think is that the biggest problem with disease is containment, and a ship is the ideal containment.

Yeah, it's an enclosed environment. You can only get so far away from other people.

[Skydiver]

As to the boat....think about how you feel right now with teh flu outbreak.....I’m shopping and someone coughing a lot gets close to me.....I move. I don’t want to be around them, don’t want to be near them.

so on a boat some wouldn’t care. some would have bravado and others would hide in their cabins. While others would hide in groups...usually until someone in that group gets sick.

there would also be fears about food and water beause on a boat there are only so many sources. some would want to control it. Likely by threats and violence.

some would expect them to head to port immediately and when that doesn’t happen the mood and violence potential will escalate.

and in the middle of this chaos, solving a murder

[BruTak]

Initially, the ship's crew would do everything they could to disguise the outbreak. Not wanting to spoil other people's cruise.

[Princess Awinita]

BruTak is correct; the ships crew would do everything they can to ensure everyone has a happy cruise, maybe hieghtned sanitary rules and regs or the like. Again the captain wouldnt be able to inform the mainland due to the signal jammer onboard, brought aboard by a passenger {Possibly Mr Azul}

The Captain also wouldnt inform the crew other then to increase the sanitary and cleaniiness of the ship and he fears one of the crew might be at fault since a friend of the 4 siblings {who was placed on the crew at the Captains request} had become violently ill from the strange virus

Now, onto the finer details; the cruise liner is 1.2KM long, can hold over 3200 guests plus full crew, 22 PUBLIC ACCESS decks {not including crew only areas of each deck} The crew itself, two members of it are friends to the four siblings on the cruise as part of their parents last will and testament. Deck 4 has the Tender Lobbies to go ashore as well as at midship the Medical Center which is able to do everything but full on brain surgery and heart transplants. There are two helicopter landing decks, one is directly behind the bridge, and the other is directly accessed via lay out ramp for the medical center in the case a paitent has to be airlifed to the nearest actual hospital

The Captain has the final say of what happens aboard the ship and he can only trust the four siblings and their three friends, two of which are on the bridge crew with his life.

And yes Sky, that is correct, there IS a murderer onboard somewhere on the ship, which again brings up Mr Azul, is he killer, viictim, innocent bystander ? Nobody knows yet. Like I said its growing and Im getting my notes together on the idea

[Skydiver]

So when they get too many sick they’d move them, maybe to the crew area? Somewhere they can control to keep the casual cruise goer away and ignorant.

eventually however word would get out. family members of hte sick would need to know

then the mood and issues would deteriorate from there. Depending on how many are sick.

Cruises re also prone to norovirus outbreaks so they’d have SOP for such things