Yow! Things are really happening here! Great chapter, Shayne!
You've done a good job from going to small things (cut-in-half passenger pigeons, stranded eurypterids) to large (the population of Denver at risk! Dinosaurs in New York!) and making them plausible, and fascinating. In fact, I look almost every day to see if there is an update. And then there is an update, and it's so good, but it ends so soon! And it's tantalizing!
Do you deliberately sit at your desk, writing this great story, and then you give the evil laugh ("Mwah-ha-ha-hah!") as you consider which cliff to leave the readers hanging on? I'm like DebbieG, who said, "Every time a new chapter of Veritas comes out, I'm happy for about five minutes as I read it. [Dance] Then I have to wait for the next one..."
So please, please, write more soon as you've got me on the edge of my chair!
More random thoughts.....
Great job setting up three different challenges/rescues at the same time for Clark, challenges that are really a no-win scenario. And great job also showing Clark's thoughts, resolve, and the things that make him Superman, really: his desire to help, and his indomitable will.
The new Clark - can't wait to see more of him! Is he the Clark from "Lois and Clark", the one who didn't lose his parents at age ten, the one who the whole show is about? Or is it some other alt-Clark?
And, if he stays in our world for some time, and gets a minute to sit down and not just deal with one crisis after another, what will his feelings be when he realizes that he's a fictional character in our world, and that everyone knows his secret identity? If he is the Clark from "Lois and Clark", he's got a secret identity that works. Better keep those passengers on his airplane ignorant!
Does the repeat of the "airplane in danger scenario" happen because the three universes are so closely linked that events must, by necessity, be very similar or identical? Or, as another poster suggested,
And if one Superman is making our government nervous, what will two do? But of course, by now, with his actions with the rifts, Superman has proved himself a friend.
But do the professional paranoids feel that way? They are probably more concerned about the power he's showing. Now they're probably even more paranoid.
Or have they just accepted that they can't do anything to Clark anyway, so just shut up and be glad he's a good guy?
Lois has basically admitted to Clark (and everyone, if they had ears to hear) that she's in love with him, that he's pulled her out of her shell, helped her to live again. Please tell me that they'll be together in the end! (Or will they still have some travails to conquer first?)
With regards to the technology that created the rifts - is this event (with multiple, uncontrolled rifts) scary enough that it will discourage further use of the technology? (Of course, Clark's damaging of the LHC will cause delay, but eventually the LHC will get fixed and we might be back in the same situation.) Will the scientists be able to study this phenomenon without triggering it, and somehow learn to control it? Is that past the scope of this fic? I can't help wondering what's going to happen with the new technology.
So, in summary of my concerns:
1) Protagonist Clark is up to his *posterior* in alligators - but he has taken up the mantle of Superman and knows that is to be his life's work. He's settled his mental issues, now he's just working on the details.
2) Not much Lois in this action-packed chapter, but her short appearance had incredible significance. Protagonist Lois has revived from her withered, dead, dry state and has blossomed again, her spirit alive within her, as she realizes she loves Clark. And she's admitted it to him. Yay!
3) But can we get them back together? And can they go back to Clark's world, so he can have his cherished secret identity?
4) And what about the other Clark or Superman? Who is he, where's he from, are they working on the same tech in his world? In fact, is Protagonist-Clark's world working on the rift tech? Are these the three universes mentioned in the chapter about the LHC malfunction?
5) And I still don't want to forget about all the passengers from the plane that Clark saved back in the first chapter! I'd hate to see those natives of Clark's universe stuck in our paranoid, suspicious, damaged world. They deserve better.
But how is Clark going to get them back? (It has to be him, right?) And, if he's busy working on the rifts, is he going to lose his chance to go through the rift that connects to his Metropolis?
6)And if Clark does get Lois, himself, and all the original passengers back to his universe, what will be the effect on our universe? For a time, Superman was real! You've done some great writing about it so far, about the effect on the characters you've described (some of whom I can remember vividly even though they haven't been seen for many chapters). It seems that by now there should be plenty of footage of Superman in action. No one will be able to deny it in the future.
And just the concept that parallel worlds are real - wow! I sense an upswing of jobs for quantum physicists. And lots of grant money.....
This chapter was so exciting - I don't know if I can survive the adrenalin rush until the next chapter comes out. (*Grovel*) - Please post more soon!
