Ah, the "Combat training" scene. We all know what that means.

The answer is clear. Kira must beat the trauma out of Dylan.

Good freaking chapter man. Clap clap clapping clap.

Thanks buddy. But I'm sorry to inform you that you read the beta. I uploaded the wrong file! It's fixed now. But if you're interested in just the changes, then you can find a Google doc link in my recent journal that highlights all of the changes.

I'll check it out. Thanks.

I feel like I already know what's going to happen in the chapter before I even read it :3

Well yeah, you were a beta reader, silly! But! The final draft had a fair few changes and additions. I would hope enough to interest you if you have not already read it. :D

but thats the thing. ive read the beta after the changes as well :3. but that didnt stop me from reading it the third time! im so happy something i suggested actually gotten in. even if its as small as mentioning how kira was happy dylan wasnt afraid of her maw.
well played hetzer. well played ;P

Great work on this Hetzer! I've been following this from the beginning and have been loving every chapter! I can't wait to see the next chapter, it's been fun seeing Dylan and Kira's relationship developing.
And I'm kinda curious, do you plan on having a cameo appearance, say Tyra and Matt from Igneus Terra as Guardian and Charge?

I'm very happy you're enjoying it so much! :)

Sadly, Tyra and Matt probably won't be getting cameos. Lieutenants Tahsah and Fletcher from the very beginning, the pair that taught the class, were actually originally Tyra and Matt. But Igneus Terra isn't canon - it needs a rewrite in my eyes and there are clear differences between it and Integration. Like dragons and gryphons being similar sized rather than double, and there are no anthros based off of domestic animals like dogs and housecats. So I didn't want to provide such a clear connection between the two stories. If anything, those two characters are cameos in spirit.

Also, I would like to say thank you very much for making me the first person you watch and my story the first of your favorites. That is just wonderful to see. :D

No problem

That's too bad about Tyra and Matt I was hoping to see if they survived the war on Earth. (I'm a sucker for happy endings )

It's funny that you should mention Tahsah and Fletcher. After reading Igneus Terra, I actually went back to integration to see what the names of the wolf guardian and her charge at the beginning were to see if they were Tyra and Matt.

Awww, if it makes you feel any better Tyra and Matthew would have survived the war if I ever bothered to finish Igneus Terra. :)

Yay!

Dylan finally seems to be opening up to Kira, even if its in the simulations.
On a side note, I think the sims are a great way of broadening the interactions between the UTO and Earth forces in this series.

Kira is the real therapist here, even if neither one of them realizes it.

And yes, the sims are great for that. I just had to put them in to allow myself access to their potential. Which is really quite boundless. I think it has worked out for the best!

Nice work conveying Dylan's wonder at what he was seeing in the simulation in this one.

It's nice to see him opening up too.

It's great to hear I pulled that off. It didn't get any thoughts during the beta, but I was still a little worried I didn't convey it all well enough.

And yes, opening up. It's about time. And with Kira too! She's the real doctor here. Duntay seems to just be a formality!

I am now eagerly awaiting the next installment.

Good to hear. The next part just entered the beta phase. So... it'll be around soonish.

Awesome. Binge read the whole thing last night, was disappointed when it was over. ;A;

By the way, are you looking for any kind of critiques/editing suggestions, or just supportive comments? I am more than capable of both.

I am very, very open to critiques. The whole alpha, beta, and editing phase I go through with a bunch of people is dedicated to making the story a great read.

So, speak your mind! Critiques and suggestions make me better as a writer.

Will do. I'm also interested in improving my writing skills, though I seem to be a lot better at editing than writing myself.
I actually have quite a few thoughts--I became very invested into the characters, prose, and plot last night--and would like to do them justice.
I have some things to do this afternoon, but I should have time to solidify and consolidate them later this evening. As it'd be fairly long, would you prefer it in a comment or in a note?

A decent amount of my readers come to me for thoughts on their writing. I'd be happy to do the same for you.

As for comment or note... Comment if you're up for it. Who knows, maybe the exchange could spur discussion from others or help someone else with their writing.

I really hope you don't hate me for this.



Thoughts as I go along and reread all eight chapters(good, bad, and neither; also, PLEASE don’t take anything I say personally or feel that I’m attacking you. Remember, I love the story, and I wouldn’t offer these thoughts if I didn’t think you weren’t already good enough to improve from them! Plus, I have a tendency to be very blunt.):

-Your universe and plot are great. Obviously, they cater to a certain niche, but with work, there’s more than enough substance for the story to appeal to a much wider audience. Change some terms, reword some descriptions, move certain things in and out of focus, and viola, it becomes relevant to all! If that’s something you want, of course.

-While by no means unreadable, your prose tends to suffer from a lack of…professionalism, you could say. A certain voice that would take it from ‘good’ to ‘great’. For example, near the very beginning of chapter 1, I noticed one of the first phrases describing humans—“They didn't have fur or scales, but soft skin, and nor did they have muzzles.” It would be much, much better as “They lacked fur, scales, and even muzzles, and instead had soft skin and flat faces.” It’s a matter of sequence breaking and making the text flow. (Another rephrase possibility: “They didn’t have fur or scales, but soft, smooth skin. They didn’t even have muzzles!”) While a relatively minor problem, many sentences like this add up and cause, shall we say, road bumps in the prose, causing it to be choppy and disjointed. And, I do see quite a few of these sentences needing such improvement. Something to think on. (As you work towards bettering this skill, it will become second nature over time. Don’t be discouraged!)

-Along the vein of making it more appealing to a wider audience but also along the lines of helping readers learn the history and learn to differentiate—as well as immerse them in delicious, savory lore(lore is my favorite thing ever, if you couldn’t tell)—you could try to establish the different races more as aliens and less as, well, macro furries, heh. Use their race names more instead of words like “wolfess” and such. And Kira wouldn’t be thinking of herself as that anyway, or of Larish as an equine, now would she? She’d think of them in their racial or cultural names.

-In a related but entirely separate note to professionalism: to be completely honest, you need more or better editors. I’m sure they’re working hard, likely just doing it for fun or as a favor, maybe even without expecting anything in return. But they miss things. Lots and lots and lots of things. A few misspelled words, some improper grammar, a lot of poorly handled punctuation, tense confusion, narrator confusion, etc. Maybe they just need to go over them one more time after taking a break with a fresh start—I don’t know the particulars, and I am not here to blame or demean them (or you!). But there is room for improvement. Prime example: Dylan describing the aliens in his first sentence. “Scythe like” is much better as “scythelike” or at least “scythe-like”. That big, empty space completely breaks stride reading. Like walking along a sidewalk and tripping headlong over a huge crack you didn’t notice. Also, commas. You’re much better with commas than many others—like a good friend of mine who uses so few commas it makes my eyes bleed whenever I read her prose—but you could stand to use more, and use them better. I admit, commas are very tricky, and a common source of confusion and frustration. But they can be mastered! Practice helps, yes, but reading helps more, and the right reading and practice help the most. And I am going to be more than a little vain and say that my capacity to work with commas is excellent, so if you need any help, I’m your guy. I can commas like nobody’s business. Examples. reading material, even informal instruction—just say the word. (The word is ‘commas’.)

(As that last paragraph might have sounded especially cold, I just want to reiterate that none of these made it unreadable for me, or detracted from the story, which I am significantly invested in. It’s a matter of seeing potential!)

-Said it before and I’ll say it again: order of words, order of words, order of words. And phrases. Sentences, phrases, and entire paragraphs can be made or broken by a little change in sequencing. Example: “They basically were stuffed…” vs. “They were basically stuffed…” Do you see the difference? The latter is 200% better: skip Park Place, pass Go, collect 200$.

-Just gotta say, I love Dylan. So much. Great background, great personality, great revelation, great development. And his little breakdown? While many people have trouble with surreal situations or abstract events, such as dreams, triggers, and trauma, I think you did extremely well. I do not suffer from PTSD, but I have, shall we say, dealt with mental illness and weakness before, and I found the entire situation very believable. It might sound strange to others, but the strangest things can be just as bad triggers, or even worse triggers, than what you might expect. (I’m referring to the sound of scraping metal triggering the traumatic flashback, and his reaction, and the way it affected him very differently from the obvious triggers, like Kira and the other alien species.)

-In a more focused commentary on tense confusion, I see that you most commonly make this mistake when narrating thoughts, especially Dylan’s. The problem with this might actually be not from the tense you use, but from the way you narrate said internal monologues. If it is part of normal narration, as you use it, it should match the tense of the rest of the prose. Example: “Then those eyes focused on him, and his legs started shaking. Don't predators smell fear? He was making a lovely first impression.” The middle sentence jumps out of past and into present. This is acceptable, but only if you make it very clear that it is the narrating character’s thoughts, by using italic or bold text, or maybe single quotes(as opposed to double for dialogue). So it might turn out as “Then those eyes focused on him, and his legs started shaking. Don't predators smell fear? He was making a lovely first impression.” or “Then those eyes focused on him, and his legs started shaking. Didn’t predators smell fear? He was making a lovely first impression.”

-Some thoughts on subject/term confusion. I see it a fair amount, again usually from Dylan. “As amazing and skilled as these guys were, some UTO recruit fresh out of basic could just step on them and all the special forces training in the world wouldn't do a damned thing to stop you from becoming paste on the bottom of a foot.” vs. “As amazing and skilled as these guys were, some UTO recruit fresh out of basic could just step on them and all the special forces training in the world wouldn't do a damned thing to stop them from becoming paste on the bottom of a foot.” or “As amazing and skilled as these guys were, some UTO recruit fresh out of basic could just step on you and all the special forces training in the world wouldn't do a damned thing to stop you from becoming paste on the bottom of a foot.” Just remember to refer to the same subject the same way, and don’t switch around. It gets…well…confusing!

-Oh, man. I just saw my worst nightmare. A comma splice. Heaven above, save us from comma splices. (I’m kidding, but I really found one. “"There's a reason we're training commandos and veteran soldiers, they can handle this madness better.” I’m sure you already know, but I’ll be a big jerk and pretend you don’t: comma splices are the worst, and are when you substitute a comma in place of a much more fitting punctuation mark, like a semicolon. That is what would have worked here.)

-Using the word ‘so’ when it doesn’t fit. When used outside of speech, it’s only used as a relative measure. Sort of. How to explain it best…(once again, I ‘assume’ you don’t know, when you very well probably do and it was more likely a typo.) Okay, look at this sentence. “The lack of a large body inside meant there was so much room for redundant systems.” That ‘so’? Doesn’t work. Trust me. If you wanted to go further than just saying that there was more room for the systems, you need a sort of…”so what”. In use, a “So x that y”. Maybe “The lack of a large body inside meant there was so much room for redundant systems that they could add ten hundred billion more gizmowhatsits than usual.” (I’m definitely not an engineer.)

-I touched on it earlier, but I’ll say it again. (I think you should) Make your ‘thought’ text distinct from your ‘literally anything else’ text. Italics are wonderful for this.

-You need better justification for reptids having mammaries, or to just leave it out. My immersion, it shatters.

-I love that you mentioned that they can’t smell emotions, and instead can only smell certain physical scent markers with a strong correlation to fear. 10/10 would like to have happen again.

-Comma Splice 2: Revenge of the Splicening. Seriously, I’m finding a lot more in dialogue. Something to work on. :D


Honestly, I could probably go on like this for a long time; I’m very good at finding faults with other people and their work. But that really isn’t my goal here, so I’ll just say that on the critique side of things, there is a lot of room for improvement, and after my reread, I decided that I’m more than willing to help you with that, if you want. (Bask in fear and adoration of the commas.) If nothing else I could join the ranks as one of your editors. It would honestly be fun—and not something new to me, as I’ve spent a few semesters grading papers/essays for a college professor.

And, that aside, I didn’t want this commentary to focus entirely on the negative, so I’ll throw out a bunch of positive and leave it at that.
-I REALLY DO LOVE YOUR WORK; DON’T LET MY MEAN, MEAN CRITIQUES MAKE YOU THINK OTHERWISE
-Dylan is the best ever and we should clone him to reuse him as a protagonist everywhere. Kira is great too, of course.
-I reeeeeally liked the way you presented opinions on patriarchy, matriarchy, etc.
-I love Trikul. I really hope he doesn’t go psycho.
-THE DUALITY OF POWER/WEAKNESS and the way it applies to both, and the extents you go to to demonstrate the fact that not only do the humans still have quite a bit to offer, but the alien leadership and officers realize this.
-I have an extreme love/hate going on with Dahashi. I want to punch him in the face a few times, but I also feel like he could be a great bro.
-Sweet merciful goodness, the simulations. I have no idea how much of the Coliseum stuff was accurate(I am not a historian), but boy was it entertaining. And the wargames? Amazing. I fricking shed tears when Dylan was comforting the dying Larish, and laughed manically (manically, not maniacally) when Dylan went all action hero.

-I could go on, and am up for chatting about writing, Integration, or anything in general, anytime, so feel free to hit me up. I do know from personal experience, on both the giving and receiving ends, how much writers like to gush about their story and their characters.
-Thanks for reading this, and for writing that! :D

Oh man, this thing looks even longer in a comment. I'm so sorry.

Oh man! This is great! I've never gotten one like this before. I'm so excited! :D

-Yes! I want that. I already made efforts for it – like the leaning towards feral anthro designs rather than the usual plantigrade with hair for some reason, and an emphasis on animal senses. And no overly endowed anthros... or any sexual emphasis. This is not meant to explore a macro fetish. It's meant to explore the dynamic that the size difference provides.

-Nothing to really say about phrasing. I just hope it's been getting better as the story's gone on. :)

-Calling the species by their real names has been getting worked on, particularly in part nine. I actually went and finally gave names to all of the races. I'm now trying to wean the reader off of the usual titles in favor of the species names. I feel stuff like equine and vulpine seem fair. However, calling a human a primate would seem odd. Either way! I'm working on it now, but should have done it way earlier. It can be excused with Dylan, though. Since with his POV, it has his thoughts. He could easily imagine his guardian as a wolf and call her that in narration. Kira, however, should not. No no no, not at all. I realized that too late.

-Editors have been tricky lately. Part One actually didn't get the eyes of an editor. The rest did, to some extent. Around part six is when I lost my normal editor to the woes of life. So he's too busy for it now. Before he stopped, I got a hold of someone else to act as the second tier, but she soon became the only one. Truthfully, she is not so good and she never said she was. She's mostly just there to find the very glaring flaws and to offer the final thoughts on the chapter. (She never reads the beta, so her opinion is very fresh.) Recently with part 8 I got an offer from someone else, and I planned to take him up on it. Funnily enough, my first editor rode my ass for too many commas. Now I hear I have too little? Madness! XD

-Nothing to say here again! Still hoping I've gotten better through the updates.

-I get consultation on PTSD related stuff from a couple of my readers. One actually has it from Afghanistan, and another is a psych student with military service and some studies into the affliction. On top of that it feels like a lot of common sense. I dunno, call it empathy.

-Tense has always been a problem with me. I've gotten much better since high school, but it still plagues me. I know exactly what I'm supposed to do, keep it all in past (present annoys me), but I still miss stuff and looking it over, I still miss it.

-Huh. I face palmed at this subject confusion. Excuse me while I get angry at myself.
…
Okay done! I feel better now.

-I'm far from skilled with semi-colons, but I do see how it should have been used there.

-So... yeah I should have never had that so in the first place. It seems dumb. I wonder if this is a recurring problem.

-As for thoughts... my understanding is there is no real rule for separating them. Considering its set in a POV right in the active character's mind, it's really all of their thoughts. Some thoughts, though, are much more direct like the one you mentioned. But my lack of separating them from the text is more a personal thing. I've thought about them before, and have moved away from it in favor or just not using them at all. Keep all thoughts in the narration, stop interrupting with a silly spoken thought that could fit into the narration like all of the other thoughts.

-Now for the reptids thing... that's another POV situation. At the time Dylan noticed that, he didn't know why. The limits of the POV meant I couldn't tell the reader, because Dylan couldn't tell them. Kira couldn't tell them either, because she wouldn't be thinking about it. Now, it's at the point where neither one would think about it. There aren't really any good points to put it in now. It's a character focused story, not a world exploring 'milieu' type story. I need a codex for this sort of thing, which I have started, to throw lore and explanations at people.

-I enjoy the idea of scents like that. It makes Kira even more capable of understanding her charge.

-Splice splice splice... at least not too many? :O

-Now friend, stop worrying about your critiques upsetting me. I've oft imagined getting a comment like this and now that I have one I couldn't be more delighted. This is a chance to improve my writing and I wouldn't dare disregard it due to some silly, pointless offense from someone that wasn't just singing straight praise. That said... thanks for the praise! I do love Dylan and I love Kira. But this IS Dylan's story more than Kira's, and I am so pleased when people realize this rather than default to loving Kira more, because anthro! Woooo! Furry!

Nooow... as for your offer to edit... I would so love to have you. I'll send you a note with details on things. After I implement a few beta changes to the Google doc I have. You really popped in at the perfect time. I JUST finished the 18.5k word alpha the night before.

Well, I'm really glad I didn't offend you or hurt your feelings or anything. (I happen to get offended way too easily, myself. One critical comment and I'm all BAWW I'M NEVER WRITING AGAIN! 's pretty much why I suck.)
I'm also very happy we seem to agree on a lot of stuff, and am especially happy to hear about what you plan to focus on--the dynamic. That's what it's always been for me; not a fetish or deviant sexuality, not a reason to, ah, indulge myself, but a fascinating and complex mechanic that leads to all sorts of fun, silly, and even tragic situations.
And while I do try not to disparage others for their 'tastes', I still find it uncomfortable at times when it feels like I'm the odd man out. Glad to find a kindred spirit!
As for the POV differences, that's fine, so long as you work on getting the tense right; I think I did show one example where you can keep it that way and keep it coherent. I just love using italics for that, myself. (Or, in some situations, like "thoughtspeak", italics and bold. Hnng. I guess I just really like dynamic prose.
And yeah, a number of mistakes, but no more than I'd expect from anyone. And a problem easily remedied!

Whoa. Well, I do have lucky timing. It's actually kind of my thing. My sixth sense, as it were. And that sounds great; after you send it, I'll note you right back with contact information and stuff.
18.5k? I'm gonna need to sit down for this one...

-_- ok...now he...this is scaring me again. I was a history major, then I dropped out. Dylan must be me from another dimension...this is unreal, have you been spying on me for the past 6 years? I'm not even kidding it's literally almost identical, my ability to relate with Dylan. I hope I'm not going crazy *has mind bending flashbacks*

Haha!... ha... spying? What? Haha... no... Ahem. *Awkward shuffle.*

It's got a fair bit of grounding in my own experiences, though I'm not military. However with college the way it's going that could change.

It's good he's got a story people can relate to. Makes him even better, I think. :D

Now if only I could relate too seeing someone like Kira as well. I'd love to meet her irl, if this actually happened I join the military faster than you can say... nothing, cuz I'd already be in the military xD

It seems me and you share a few common interests my friend! Keep up this beautiful story, I...need it O_o

This is better than many novels I read. I can rightly say that thus is as good as Timothy Zahn'a original Thrawn trilogy, my most cherished paperback novels.

KOTE BORARIR VOD!

Hey just wanted to say, my mate introduced me to this story and I love it so far, it's really lovely. Very inspiring for writing micro/macro or drawing it~.

Not sure what Dylan's beef is with Captain Duntay. Mr huge rabbit outranks him and is trying to be considerate, a private getting fresh with an officer could land him in hot water.