I have been eagerly looking forward to this! Thank you for including me as a Triceratops here! I'm honored.

You have done a nice job emphasizing the history behind what your setting and while the details of the war and its reasons are still sketchy, that's okay at this point. The flashback scene did a wonderful job showing the brutal psychological situation the dinosaurs found themselves in. I confess I'm not too keen on the idea that the character named after me was killing civilians, but I'll let you write your story.

The only thing you really need to go back and fix is the pronouns used for Loren; over a dozen times you used female pronouns for the male Loren. Gotta be careful there!

Do let me know if I can be of help for future chapters in any way.

Dominus tecum

I'm glad you're enjoying it. Once I finish some editing for part 3 I can finish writing the chapter and then I can get that one up, though I'm bouncing between projects but hopefully it won't be too long.

Details on the war will come out more in chapters 3 and 4, when there's one more short flashback and in chapter 4 they start discussing the war from a present perspective.
I'm not too keen on the idea of killing civilians myself, but I just think it's implausible to expect that the characters would not be forced to do things they don't want to do under the conditions they were forced to live under. The main thrust of the story is about how they don't intend to let that happen ever again.

I was afraid of that. I thought I got them all, but I guess not. It's a side effect in that the first draft being originally a reboot of the chakat mythology Loren's role was female, so I guess I'll need to go back and fix that. Oops ;)

Thanks for the wonderful feedback. :)

You do seem to keep a lot of projects going at once!

War is just another form of hell; that atrocities are committed and that soldiers are forced to commit them should not come as a surprise. Even in our own day, the Western ideal of treating the enemy with respect and protecting civilians is withering away; when we punish one of our own for trying to stop a child from being molested by one of our 'allies', we have abandoned any claim to being civilized or moral.

And I think what you have made them do is perfectly legitimate to set the stage for the conflict to come. It just raises a question in my mind, how much psychological damage have the dinosaurs received from those moments; are they haunted by those ghosts?

I sent you a note with some other things I caught and something else that may be of help!

Keep up the great work! I look forward to the next chapters!

Oh, what picture is the icon from? I don't recall seeing it now.

Dominus tecum

I suppose better too many than not enough! I remember before my hiatus I did that too, only now I take it at my own pace and write what I want, which works much better.

That much is true, it's sad that at times it's necessary, and I hope I never have to see it myself. I'm still all for that ideal though.

You can bet there are lasting effects. You'll particularly see it in Tango and Melantha. Loren and Matthias were strong for their sake, but they did not escape without scars. Chapter 3 and 4 will elaborate more on this, and there are afterimages for a long time planned. I uploaded the edits with your feedback, and I need to remember to add the explanation about the hair, will edit it in tomorrow if I remember.

The icon is from a mature submission, a gift for Enmesarra, but I didn't want to use the same icon for every chapter so I thought an image of dino me would do. I'll probably use Quill from the same image for another and perhaps that fancy image of Matthias on the airship which I've always loved.

I'm glad you're enjoying it so much. :)

I have a lot of ideas but only a limited amount of time to work on any of them so I tend to stick with one until it is finished (except for music, which I do whenever I get inspiration).

You and I both are for the ideal. Let us hope that a real peace an be found.

I read your updated version. It looks good to me! Thank you for including my snippet. I hope that it helps. I am very interested in seeing how you handle the 'lasting effects'.

And that is why I could not find the original image! No worries. And if you do use the image of Matthias on the airship, please link back to the original submission. You certainly have my permission to use it.

Well, the story features dinosaurs in space, and even has a Triceratops I can identify strongly with. So far at least it's a real treat to see. I just hope that others are enjoying it too!

Dominus tecum

Yeah, me too. Though I tend to let my muse decide what to work on and in what order. If I'm feeling it and such I an finish a page relatively quickly, but if I don't feel it, I take the night off or whatnot. A lot of it has to do with my mood, I like think that my muse works great when it gets the impulse, but it can't be forced. It helps a lot if I have my story plotted out so I can decide how to write the scene rather than determine the whole plot on the fly.

I'd be happy if war was only a narrative device you see in shows and movies and books and never again in real life.

It was so perfect, it fit right at the end like it belonged there, and I think it made the second chapter that much better. :) I still need to put in another edit for the hair and maybe a few other additions, but I'll get to it. :) It'll be a strong series, I think. :)

I might, and if so I certainly will.

I do as well! ;) I don't know how 'well known' I am, but I hope the more writing I put out, the more folks will tune in, both to the comics and the stories. :)

I always plot out my stories in advance; I'd never make progress otherwise since I have so little time to work on them (and sometimes I have the time just no energy). I'm rather hoping I can get my current tale finished this week.

Again, I'm glad you liked what I wrote! And let me reiterate my offer to help with future chapters a little.

Well, on FA you do have a pretty decent following so I'd say you are reasonably well known in the fandom.

Dominus tecum

Yeah, for me I need to know where I'm going, or I'd get stuck not knowing what to write. It helps in making the time useful. ;)

Once I finish one or two of the projects I'm working on I'll probably switch gears and finish the next chapter of Exodus. I'm going to try to have three projects in work, three in development, and just rotate through things. ;)

Okay. I do hope I get to see that next chapter, even a draft, before I go in for surgery, but if you don't get to it by then I understand.

Dominus tecum

I might be able to, it's about 70% finished and needs to be edited for the dino characters but it's feasible. I hope to finish the last few pages of a short story I have almost done and then I can work on it in between my other project ;)

Be sure to fave this chapter! ;)

Okay, sounds great! I look forward to seeing it and letting you know what I think!

Dominus tecum

Note me your email so I can put it on file. :)

Fixed the pronouns, repaired a taur reference I apparently missed, and changed a few details, made us a little less of that kind of soldier but I think I preserved the original intent. :)

First, I need to apologize for missing this... I absolutely loved this new chapter. The continuing story gets deeper and more intriguing with every step.

The characters are all well-defined and come across as individuals with their own personalities and quirks. I definitely liked the interplay with Quill... showing her more severe side. Made her more real and well-balanced. Looking forward to seeing more of the characters interacting, especially the dinos. The flashback was handled very well, adding more to the story, rather than detracting from it - as most do. A lot of information was presented during the chapter, but you wove it into the narrative flawlessly, so it didn't feel like an info-dump.

If I have one critique, it's that some of the dialogue felt stilted - just didn't sound right. However, that's easily fixed by reading it aloud and editing for flow where you stubble over the words. Actually, you might be interested in this podcast. Very useful

All in all, this is another amazing chapter and I can't wait to see how the characters all come together and adapt to one another.

*HUGS* And thank you again for allowing me the honor of being a part of this fantastic work.

I was surprised when it had been two weeks and I hadn't heard anything. I was certain you'd have commented on it by then, but I forgot you had a busy week. LOL. Anyway, I'm glad you're enjoying it, and I put a lot of thought into this so I'm glad it shows.

You'll see more of that as the series continues. I've always felt that if you're telling a story and you can't get a feel for each and every major character then you're doing it wrong. Sparks for example is generally cheerful, good at her job, but she's a bit klutzy. She'd be a friendly person to talk to and generally wouldn't harm a fly, but her engines are her babies. Captain Quill obviously has a lot in her past that she hasn't talked about, but in the present she is concerned about her crew and the job, and now that she has a mystery on her hands she needs answers. If it doesn't make sense it won't fly in her universe, and she needs to know where the dinos came from, especially since her father claimed he encountered them. The truth has to come out, according to her anyway.

The flashbacks in these chapters, this and the next, are designed to establish the dinos relationship to each other as well as the world they came from. This really cannot be done any other way, which is why the flashbacks are needed. Loren and the others are thrust into this new world, and for that to make sense, to know what they're feeling, you need to know where they came from and what they came out of. Once the baseline is established, the goal is to bring them to the point when they went into stasis, and from then on we can just learn about who they are now, as the captain does.

It's a lot to absorb, but it's all important. The conversation between the captain and the doctor and the main flashback helped convey a lot of the story in not a lot of space, and it's all about economy of story. I never like to waste time with scenes that don't move the story forward, so I try to make sure that whatever is being said or done accomplishes something.

Can you give me an example? Dialogue is usually my strong point, but I'm sure there may have been some points that may have been clunky in the edits.

I think you've handled the flashbacks wonderfully. It also allows for some introspection on Loren's part. Usually, they come across as info-dumps, but not here.

As for examples, here are a couple of the lines that I stumbled over:

"...There’s a little question as to their origin but from what I’ve found in the files they’re apparently a native population of an isolated part of the world that were conscripted into the military of one of the major world powers..."

"...It’s present in only a small fraction of the soldiers, but it seemed like if they’d had more time during the war they might have been able to duplicate the result, perhaps even improve upon it..."

“...Given that we are obviously at your mercy at the moment, and I am in command of my people as the highest ranking soldier here, until I understand what’s going on it seems that I have no choice but the follow the commands of the highest ranking person on board...”

Each seems to be trying to get a couple of ideas into the same line, which alters the flow. They're not entirely bad, but considering your normally punchy and 'natural' dialogue, these stood out more to me. A little rewording or rephrasing will make them more natural.

otherwise, I think this is an excellent addition to the series

Thank you! I agree, I wanted folks to get to know the dinosaurs and the world they came from, to make it clear how different their upbringing was from 50 years later where Quill is from. Not only do you get to see how they ended up where they are, but you learn more about the war which will be important later. My goal was to not only explain the backstory, but the flashbacks in themselves tell a mini story of their own that adds to the greater narrative.

I've fixed all the lines you mentioned and clarified them, broken them up into smaller more manageable sentences. I'm working on finishing chapter 3 and Megan's part 1, and when I'm done with both of those I'll think of what to work on next. ;)