In my WIP novel "Lives in Time", I make mention of a decoration character, Daria Valenti: He smiled at her ruefully. “Did Mata Hari have a sidekick?” She smiled back. “I don’t know who that is, but Daria Valenti does; a man named Hale.” She winked at him. “She keeps him around for his good looks and ability to lift large, heavy objects.” Daria Valenti, a war hero in real life who went on to star in her own series of sensationalized action films full of intrigue, speed, and ass- kicking, indeed had a sidekick named Hale. A huge man from central Africa, handsome with loads of sex appeal and strong as an elephant, he was about as smart as a box of hammers. Except when it came to fixing things, which he could do with next to nothing in an impossibly short amount of time. Marko loved the movies, at the same time hating the lack of adherence to reality. “Hale, huh? I hope you think I’m smarter than that.” I'd like to write a short story (~5-10K words) about these characters as a side piece. If anyone has any plot ideas, I'd love to hear them. The "war" is described in my timeline thusly: 2160-2173 -- The Last War, ended by the Treaty of Amman. 100 million people die, mostly in nuclear assaults. So, a high-tech, future war that involves the entire world. I imagine Valenti as some sort of intelligence officer; smart, capable, and highly-trusted by the people she works for to get things done. Suggestions?
I always like using the war as a background vibe for an otherwise unrelated story. Actual war stories, in my opinion, tend to be overdone and kind of blah. Especially from the futuristic/sci-fi-ish perspective. I call it the Death Star effect, where you see a lot of stories about blowing up the Biggest Weapon Ever. I've always liked writing about criminals and profiteers in the background war setting. You know, world's going to shit, everything we believe in is about to disappear, zillions of innocent people are about to die, so, great... how can I use this to get paid? Also extremely overdone, but that doesn't mean you can't add a new twist to it. Not that having a badass female character blowing all kinds of shit up between wisecracks doesn't have a certain fanboy appeal and marketing avenue, but there's more that can be done. I'm not saying your character is like that or anything, but all the writers that came before us have killed it for my tastes. See, nuclear weapons in 150 years would strike me as archaic and low tech... might be something you can use from a misdirection sense.
Yeah, I wouldn't want her to blow anything up, at least not regularly. I'm thinking one or two (at most) displays of competency with martial arts, just to establish her capability, e.g. during an evasion scene, she encounters someone she needs to dispatch and does so handily. Gotta feed the ducks, you know. In my writing, I specifically work to establish female characters as fully able to take care of themselves, even the minor ones. But that doesn't mean that they're all Wonder Woman or Captain Marvel, any more than the male characters come off as Superman or Wolverine. Her movie character is a blend of Black Widow and Lara Croft, but her "real life" character (I'm getting very Inception here) is, as I said, smart and capable, and does one or two truly heroic things during the war, but nothing quite so cinematic. For a real real world example, look at Gal Gadot, who was in the Israeli military (no heroics I'm aware of) and now plays the part of Wonder Woman. I'm considering writing another story that's one of her movies. The opening paragraph would be Marko settling into a movie seat with popcorn, then the lights go down and the explosions start...
I don't know. A sci-fi film noir wartime spy flick would be a lot more fun to write. Maybe she isn't a Wonder Woman, but there has to be a middle ground between WW and an army grunt. You mentioned Mata Hari. Do something like that. Think Casa Blanca meets Buckaroo Bonsai.
Fair enough. She's been receiving state secrets from an enemy officer she seduced. He gets caught and sets her up as part of a deal to save his own neck. She's arrested and has to escape using her Black Widow skills. ETA: I'd be more specific, but I don't know your world.
She seduces the janitor who works in enemy headquarters. Whenever he dusts the interior of the safe, he takes photographs of the top secret documents with his bionic eye. Little does she know that the janitor has also been seduced by an enemy operative, who has forced him to supply your heroine with false documents. She finds out, and hunts down the enemy operative. Epic battle ensues: She kills the enemy operative and takes the secret plans. Edit: I didn't realize the clip was the German dub.
I note a consistency in the suggested plots: "she seduces..." I realize it's a classic trope, but I'd like to avoid it. Take gender out of the question, what's the plot?
The acronym for an intelligence officer recruiting an agent is MICE... Money, Ideology, Conscience, and Ego... in general seducing them isn't a massively common practice Money - straight forward transactional relationship Ideology - They agree to spy for russia because they're a communist (but they're actually spying for Nazi germany because it was a false flag op) Concience - they feel bad about xyz, you sympathise with them and promise to help make it right ... e.g they are antiwar you convince them that by giving you information they are making the war less likely. Ego: they feel personally slighted by their boss/colleagues/ being passed over for promotion, so they agree to spy to show themselves how much better they are than those guys... Blackmail works in the short term - we know you're having an affair, if you don't spy for us we'll share the photos... but its risky because they resent it and want to find a way to fuck you back
You mentioned Mata Hari and Black Widow, so that was the go to. He could always just be a legitimate recruit in the resistance who turns on her to save his hide. Or maybe his family is threatened. He doesn't have to be a worm.
Yeah, further on the Inception thing, I'm aiming to separate the "real" (from my storyline) Daria Valenti from the action movie heroine based on her. This is all so "meta". Until this discussion started, she was just a decoration character. Now I feel like there's something there I need to do. :|
