Not everyone talks like Data from Star Trek

I saw a H50 fic mentioned on tumblr, and thought I’d check it out.  It’s called, “Five Times it Didn’t Count (and One it Totally Did)“.  Yes, the concept is pretty cute.  And I’m a sucker for kidfic – and this one starts out with Gracie, so yeah, it’s cute.

But there’s something about the dialogue of this fic.  It’s like it’s written by Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation.  There’re no contractions in it.  At first it was a little off, but the more I read, the more it bugs me.

A little help from a beta – especially one good with dialogue, would help a great deal.  Also, words like “bedroom” are just that – bedroom and not “bed room”.

You were SO close…

Okay, so I can usually take a word or two out of place.  You know, the mixup of “your” and “you’re” and the like.  It’s not too bad.  But when you couple a bunch of them with such an out-of-character description of John Sheppard?  Yeah, that makes it pretty bad…  That’s how I feel about the SGA/Sentinel fusion story “For Me“.

Now don’t get me wrong.  The premise of the story is good.  It’s just – I don’t know… REALLY hard to swallow when John Sheppard is so blatantly out of character it’s not even funny.  This is the very first passage that includes Sheppard:

He wiped at his eyes hurriedly as he went in search of the enticing aroma his nose was sniffing appreciatively.

He found it in the Gate room scattered in with the new recruits that’d just gated in. Rodney went up to it and buried his face in its neck, sniffing happily.

“What the fuck?”  A startled voice exclaimed.  But the person it belonged to didn’t try to push him away.  Rather strong arms pulled him closer.

After a long moment of ecstatic sniffing Rodney looked up.  “Hi,” he said shyly.

Gentle hands cupped his face.  “Hello.  Mind telling me what you’re doing?”

Seriously.  John Sheppard, as emotionally repressed and standoffish as he is, would never willingly let a stranger, who’s suddenly attached to him at the neck, just stay there, much less pull him in closer.

I think there’s so much you could do with an SGA/Sentinel fusion story (and honestly, I think this story could be salvaged by being rewritten to be more in character, etc).  I mean seriously – go read esteefee’s “A.W.O.L.“; it’s incredible!