Hey Clement
In order for me to really review this properly, I'd need to go back to the start and re-read the whole thing, remind myself of all the little details like the special card that Zephon lost to the SeeD and where Marcus's knife came from - and I just don't have time for that right now, because I have a whole bunch of beta reading on my hands. But for what it's worth, here's my impressions.

I think that other reviewer missed the point when he said Zephon was overpowered. I might be completely wrong, since I don't know this game that well, but it never struck me that he was overpowered; I got the impression that Zephon is simply lucky - so lucky that it's beginning to make other people suspicious of him. And of course, he let a friend die in order to save himself, and he's been afraid ever since that someone will find out. Zephon is no Zack; he isn't a soldier for the glory, and he doesn't want to be a hero, he just wants earn a decent paycheck and stay alive long enough to earn an honourable discharge with a pension. But he also tries to do the best job he can, and he tries to be loyal to his platoon-mates.

You writing style is great, crisp and witty, especially the dialogue. I think I've said that before. Sometimes I really appreciate your curt way of tagging the dialogue:

"Afterwards, the three retreated to the graveyard wall.

"I'll never get used to that…" Mir, in red today,

"Yes you will, Ma'am." Ker.

"…Well, if SeeD don't settle down..."

"They won't. They can't, now. They know we'll be coming."

But there are times when I can't work out who is talking. And this leads me into what is probably my biggest problem with this fic - characterisation of minor characters.

Marcus is well-developed; I get a strong sense of who he is. Thrustaevis, as you know, is my favourite character. Zephon is also well-developed. These three main characters are all strong. But I can't tell the minor characters apart. They seem to be all more or less the same, aside from their names. This is probably due in part to the nature of posting on , with long gaps between each update, which means I forget who these people are. But even when I'm reading about them, I don't get any sense that they have distinct personalities, and I can't form a visual picture of them. Thus, for example, it was impossible for me to care much when Matt died, because to me he was just a name - like a Star Trek redshirt. The net effect of this, for me anyway, is that Zephon seems to exist in a blur of people he really doesn't give a toss about. He appears to have no friendly or romantic inclinations towards anyone. Maybe this is because his sense of duty towards his beloved family leaves no room for anything else?

Still here, and still thinking that your writing is good, good enough for me to be enjoying this, but your OC is pretty ridiculously overpowered. Even Galbadanian Elites were canonically no match for a SeeD is full combat. Let alone Sword who as Trepie 13's boyfriend would be an experienced SeeD.

The first attack that hit Zephon should have pulped him.

This is jarring as hell because it is accompanied by good description and flow, few if any mistakes in each chapter. A good underlying plot and development of it, I mean this is a good story other then the fact that the guys you've introduced (Marcus and Zephon) are both so ridiculously overpowered that it's unbelievable. This story is simultaneously brilliant and awful, which I suppose is an achievment in its own right really.

I'm very disappointed right now. This has been on my to-read list for years and I finally got around to it, I enjoyed the first chapter and I was enjoying this one too...then you had Adel and her Knight, both beings of godlike power, fall to a qunintet of random soldiers.

Seriously?

I mean Adel was bad enough, but at least you tried to pretend that Marcus was simply extraordinarily lucky in that bit, but her knight being killed by random gunfire makes precisely f*ck all sense.

This fic is well written, very well written, but the entire draw for me was a chance to see the universe of ff8 from a perspective of someone who isn't obscenely powerful and who does actually have to worry about being shot or encountering monsters. It appears that you have decided instead to make your random soldiers vastly more powerful then the actual characters...I'm incredibly disappointed right now...damn...

Huff... this's a pretty innovative piece of art, providing another point of view of the game... Nice job!

So, will Deling City survive the missile base's self-destruction?

God, I am like the worst reviewer ever. I think I've read this chapter three times, and every time I start reviewing, I get interrupted.

I'm becoming more and more interested in Zephon as a character. I don't want to commit myself to any statements about what he's like, because I think he's going through a change process - and the primary factor in this change process is the need to stay alive and out of trouble. TBH I don't really remember in detail what happened earlier in the story; now that I'm on holiday, I need to go back and read it through from the beginning. That will give me a better perspective on how he's changed. He joined the army in the first place in order to provide for his family, especially his sister - their interactions are just gloriously true to family life - but the death of his friend was his turning point, and ever since then he's been scrambling to keep himself covered. The fact that he was unhesitatingly prepared to burn down an entire tenement block in self-defense is indicative of how much he's changed, I think. And he wants to hide these changes from his sister - but she's so sharp-eyed. And I don't think Zephon is very good at lying. It makes him anxious.

I loved the scene at the end. His friends (?platoon buddies?) are hitting a little too close to the nerve with their questioning, which is getting him riled, but he's trying not to show it. What pushes him over the edge is the thought of Thrustaevis feeling guilty about his broken tooth. Is Kersan implying that she knows he's lying, at the end there?

Well, that's interesting. Edea, a pawn. I never knew her backstory, because I gave up playing VIII before I got that far. All I knew was that she'd been married to Cid. He grew old and I guess she didn't.

I like what you did here with the TV broadcast, and the assumptions of Zephon and his family that the SeeDs are all in it together. Their complete lack of concern for Deling's welfare, on a personal level, rang true. I think I'd react in exactly the same way if Stephen Harper was similarly taken prisoner during a live news broadcast: interested in an abstract way about what it will mean for my country and the world, but much more worried about what it might mean for me and my family.. And of course Zephon is longing for a reason to launch an attack on SeeD.

The dialogue was nearly always easy to follow. Once or twice I couldn't tell which SeeD was speaking, but only because I've played VIII just the once and can't remember the dialogue. A good fan would have known.

I feel as if a noose is very, very slowly being tightened around Zephon's neck.

Oh, by the way, I forgot to say in my previous review that I liked the first line of the next chapter, where Zephon notices that the ceiling needs replastering. It took me a moment's thought, but then I had the full image conjured up of him lying in bed staring up at the ceiling, thinking. His defiant carving of his continued existence into the headboard with the Tonberry knife was a nice touch, too.

I've been so busy at work, it's taken me a while to find the time to do this properly. Can I start off by saying how much I love Thrustaevis? She's the kind of sister every boy needs. They comes across as a pretty happy family when they're together, and they definitely feel like, and interact like, family. This makes me root for Zephon all the more, because I like his family and I want him to return to them safe and sound both in limb and mind.

Zephon is a wonderful character. He's so normal, so low-key. He plays cards. He wants a cool coat. He doesn't try to be heroic, he has a sense of fair-play, and he tends to go with the flow. At the same time, he's not going to be anybody's doormat; he has his pride. He signed up for the army because he needed money; he tried to be the best soldier he could be short of actually dying for his country, he tried to take care of his comrades, but when his own life was on the line, he did what we would all do: he fought to live, and killed one of his own. Although I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that Trevor isn't dead.

His passionate hatred of SeeD comes across strongly in contrast to his fairly easy-going, or at least accepting, attitude towards everything else. One thing I'm not sure of is how closely Zephon identifies himself and his interests with that of the Galbadian army, or even of Galbadia. His hatred for SeeD seems personal. He does come across as patriotic, but not to the extent of sacrificing his life or his family's well-being.

The dialogue is always a pleasure to read: it's very natural and, when Zephon's family are together, relaxed and funny, just as families are together. The boredom of the barracks, Marcus's warning about likely sources of trouble, and the emotional significance of the card 'duels' are all well done. Sometimes when reading your stories I've had trouble working out who was doing or saying what (and why), but over the last two chapters that hasn't been a problem.

The thing I think you do so well is conveying this sense of how the normal lives of average citizens go on in these realms of fantasy and magic. You make the magic mundane, which is a good thing. You also have me much, much more interested in the plot of VIII than I was when I played it, probably because I care more about Zephon and Thrustaevis than I did about Squall and Rinoa.

Do you have a grand plan for where this is going, or do you make it up as you go along? It feels now as if you intend to retell the entire story from Zephon's point of view.

I haven't visited in maybe a year and a half, but as soon as I started Live by the Sword, I was hooked. Even when I was a frequent visitor, I NEVER read an entire story through, mostly because of how often the pieces I found seemed to strain to find a clear arc. Reading your take on this facet of the FF8 plot has been entertaining every step of the way, however.

I, for one, don't think having your protagonist face a SeeD was much of a stretch - these are children, after all, and however powerful they may be, the playable party in the game is more likely than not well above the norm in terms of raw talent. Zephon, while no expert, was shaped into a soldier by a force fully expecting to face superior foes, while the SeeD are little more than high schoolers wielding the biggest guns there are.

Your violent portrayal of magic and its potential for more unorthodox uses gels well with my general understanding of how such a thing would work in a world beyond just what the game provides. It's refreshing to see someone else treat giant arcs of lightning and balls of fire as tangible, deadly things, instead of just puffs that 'knock you out'.

I greatly enjoy the comedic undercurrent in all the soldier dialogs - there's a sense of genuine, real-life coping mechanisms in the way they embrace Triple Triad that echoes the pop song singing in Generation Kill, or the pipe smoking bit in Platoon. Or, you know, the millions of silly things actual soldiers do to keep their minds off of the horrors they will face practically every other moment of their day.

I'm glad I discovered this, and sincerely hope you continue to produce such refreshing work.

Don't usually go for OC fics, especially in Final Fantasy. (After all, the suspense requirements almost invariably turn most characters into idiots at strategic moments - insert just one character with the ability to think intelligently, and all too often that character turns into a Mary-Sue almost of its own volition...)

That's a thin line you're riding, and you've drifted over it just the teensiest bit a couple of times. But thus far, you're holding it together rather well...and the fact that you seem to have taken a serious amount of effort to make the fic canon-compliant - with imagination and a good sense for extrapolation - inclines me toward forgiveness for this.

Hope to see your next installment soon. Good luck.

ty for the mention! and thanks for reassuring me that you won't abandon your writing :) Really happy to hear about that!

I really enjoyed the fight in this chapter. Normally when fights are fast paced such as this they become a little hard to follow but this one flowed perfectly.

The chapter was still very believable and compelling but it'd be very nice to see some sort of explanation for either Zephon's high hp/level or the SeeD's low attack power/level but I'm sure you'll think of something.

I really love the idea that you can feel the magic being pulled out of you and I guess that the only people who see the sparks from drawing magic are the ones actually drawing it out. Does the GF allow them to see this?

Nice job!

Please please please continue this story! I have been checking to see if you have updated this at least once every fortnight. There are so many great pieces of fanfiction that are left unfinished please do not let this become one of them. This is a great story and I really would love to see this updated :)

Very beautifully written. I like Zeph more and more. One of the things that is really coming across for me reading this fic is how rich the world of FFVIII - more rich and varied than VII, I think. Yet I didn't really appreciate its richness when I played the game. The characters bored me - unlike your Zeph. I never liked the SeeDs much (except for Irvine) - I simply found it impossible to believe in them as elite mercenaries, whereas in FFVII (and Compilation) it's relatively easy to believe that Sephiroth, Genesis, Zack, Cloud etc... are real soldiers. But because I'm interested in what happens to Zeph, I have more of an appreciation of his world. You even make me want to learn how to play the cards (and I got badly burned playing Pokemon with my six year old, who would always stack my deck so I'd have a losing hand!). The dalogue amongst the Galbadians was wonderful; it rang true, like a real conversation. And the mounting tension of the card game was expertly done. I felt a pang when Zeph lost his father's card. And then - the terrible, deadly slip of the tongue...

Can't wait to find out what's going to happen to him now.

Really enjoyed this chapter too! You did fine with the card game, I really like the idea of people paying to gets cards printed and creative licensing really fits in with the story.

I also really enjoyed the politics aspect too.

I really like where this is going. Please continue it. I'd love to see what happens :)

Now that the action has moved into the mountains it's *really* getting exciting.

Are you a soldier, Clement, or something like? This reads as if you're writing from personal experience. All these battles scenes are so vivid and detailed it's like watching a movie play inside my head. The lessons in tactics, the various maneuvers and so on all seem to be carefully plotted move by move. And, as always, I love the way they use magick (see, I got it right) as just another weapon in their arsenal. I think my favourite line of all was the one about the bullet punching ripples in the Captain's Protect.

I love the light touches of humour in it, particularly the soldier's graveyard humour. They all come across as realistic, and varied, human beings. Zephon has been pretty brave for a long time, given that he's still a fairly inexperienced soldier, and it was very believable that he should crack at the end and think only of his own survival. Did he really kill Trevor? And what's going to happen to him next? I really, really hope he doesn't die.

I like Thrustaevis and would love to see more about her.

Gosh this chapter was great! Excellent battle description. Is Zephon going to follow our guys in the main plot in the background longer? Please continue :)