NOTES (written to the inspirational tune of Duo Maxwell's KITTO OK!) on The Crossroads: 7 out of 7 parts completed 1 August 2000

THESE NOTES HAVE MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE CROSSROADS. IT IS RECOMMENDED THAT YOU READ THE FANFICTION BEFORE READING THE NOTES FOR THE SAKE OF CLARITY AS WELL AS PLOT.

Writing The Crossroads was like nothing I had ever attempted before, even in my own attempts to write an original fiction novel. The whole fanfic reads more like a stand-alone novel, with Tomo and Soi and Miboshi acting as stand-in characters. I could easily have subbed in original characters, taken out the FY emphasis, and I would have had a rather short novel in itself.

But that's beside the point. Why DID I choose such an ambitious undertaking on such an odd choice of characters and plot? Well, the answer itself is quite simple. There are not nearly enough Tomo or Soi fics out there, and not nearly enough of them exploring Tomo and Soi's relationship. I'm not talking about a sexual or romantic relationship, or even friendship. This is merely a working kind of partnership, or, as some would put it, rivalry. I wrote Crossroads to partly undermine the notion that Tomo and Soi were rivals, and partly to support it. If that makes sense. My belief is that while they WERE rivals (for Nakago, for attention, etc.) they did not hate each other as some fans and/or websites have made it out to sound.

The references to Nakago, to their life at Kutou palace...all that I threw in to highlight the fact that they did have things in common and to keep them on their goal. Both Tomo and Soi, as I see them, are ambitious and very powerful seishi. That ambition and power, if directed towards a single goal, can have very potent results, as demonstrated in Crossroads.

However, I didn't write this to be a mere demonstration of what Tomo and Soi could do. Crossroads is also more of a philosophical dialogue on Tomo and Soi's thoughts on love, life, being seishi, and just their thoughts in general. I've always wanted a chance to develop already well-known characters like this, and Tomo and Soi were prime targets. You'll see them change throughout the seven chapters, and hopefully my character development was not terribly out-of character. I wanted to show them as they matured through a short period of time, showing them as their feelings towards their mission, their lives, and each other underwent radical change. I hope I managed to do that.

The Crossroads, as mentioned on the splash page for the fic, is actually a Chinese (Beijing) Opera. As Tomo was a Chinese Opera actor/singer/dancer, I chose to base the story on an opera to kind of symbolize the themes of past, present, and future all meeting in one (a crossroads). You'll see Opera themes coming up now and again in the fic. Hopefully they won't seem too out of place in an anime fanfic. (A side note: the name of the innkeeper in the opera, Liu Li Hua, means "Smooth Tongue" or "Glib Tongue" in Chinese.)The Chin ese characters at the beginning of each section break, the Chinese chapter titles, and the other Chinese references all stem from the Beijing opera setting. Sadly, I have no idea when this particular opera was written, though it's probably not very modern. I was aiming for something more ancient, since FY is set in ancient China. Any information on The Crossroads Beijing Opera would be extremely helpful.

I want to mention a few highlights from my writing experience with The Crossroads, parts of the fic that really struck me while I was writing or reading it over. WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD! This fic is actually not AU and supposed to be set somewhere in between Nakago sending Amiboshi to Konan and the Seiryuu setting out to find the shinzahos. Fit it in how you will.

Chapter 1 is not really much of anything. It introduces Soi and Tomo as they are perceived in the eye of the FY fan: bitter, rivals, sparring to see who can make who angry. You'll notice the pervasive theme of Nakago. At the beginning here, it is Nakago who keeps the two of them together on this mission.

Chapter 2 is one of the best things, in my opinion, that I have ever written. Not in terms of plot, but in terms of character development. Because of the plot structure of the particular opera I modeled the story after, I didn't have the luxury of developing the characters in two or three chapters. It had to be done in one long chapter, and at first I thought that was an impossible task. Of course, if you haven't figured that out by now, I delight in impossible tasks. At first it really was impossible. The first two sections were a pain to write and I simply didn't know where to go with the story. Then the writing inspiriation struck and I just couldn't seem to stop writing. Tomo and Soi wrote themselves, basically. I used Nakago a lot here too, as well as the themes of masks and illusions. Masks because of Tomo's paint, which by taking off he undergoes a sort of rite of passage. Illusions pertain to Tomo's seishi power. Soi's and Tomo's sparring about masks and illusions and paint and singing might seem a bit redundant, but I tried to weave the theme throughout the chapter that to work together, masks and illusions of the past had to come off both of them. Tomo's singing is like that also, as well as his paint and other remnants of his opera past. At the beginning of the chapter, Soi has to sneak over to the sleeping Tomo to see him without his paint. At the end, he takes it off willingly. This is an indication of their growth and trust towards each other. Soi's mask, as she said, is Nakago. He is her paint, the thing she hides behind to pretend to herself and the world that she is strong enough by herself.

You'll notice that I seem to focus a bit more on Tomo than Soi. No philosophical reason for this: I just like Tomo more than Soi. ^_^

[Tomo: KAKAKAKAKAKA]

The next few chapters are like chapter 1: fillers. The separation of Soi and Tomo was a bad bad idea, and by the time I realized it, I had already written too far ahead and it was too late to change it. I might still if I feel like it, but right now I'm too lazy to do anything about it. Still, since the main characters are separate in the opera, I supposed I should do it sooner in the fic, but it turned out that separating them was a mistake. There are ghosts and demons on the path to Miboshi's castle, and they decide to arrive separately? Yeah right. But it makes for a good plot device. The journey to Miboshi's castle is a test of both of their wills. Tomo and Soi have both been strengthened by their ordeals in the forest, where they were working together. Separate, their limits become clear. Even Tomo does have his limits, believe it or not. Soi is weaker than Tomo, and I show this by having Miboshi suck her in by having the ground collapse from under her, while Tomo just calmly is invited in. Chapter 5's title, "The Foundation," has nothing to do with Miboshi's castle, but is the translation of Tomo's seishi name in Chinese.

Chapter 6 is another turning point chapter. This focuses on the two seishis' past and their inner thoughts. Through Miboshi's manipulations, I wanted to show the turmoil inside their minds and the struggles they had to go through. Another "rite of passage," if you will. In Tomo's case, this included the scene with his mother throwing him into the river to drown him (he was later found by a dancer and named Ryo Chuin), the emperor vision, and the fetus vision. The emperor scene might seem incongrous because, as Tomo said himself, it's Nakago who wants to be ruler of everything, not Tomo. But Tomo is in love with Nakago, and don't we consciously or unconsciously wish to emulate the people we love? Also, Tomo is extremely powerful, and the emperor vision shows the raw hunger for power that might have been if Nakago had not been there to be the leader for the Seiryuu shichi seishi. The emperor represents the epitome of power and glory and human accomplishment. The fetus, on the other hand, is the primordial side of man, the primal instincts that every human is born with and never entirely extinguishes. Tomo's mental battle with Miboshi there goes back to illusion and masks. His final ability to admit that there is more to life than just mere illusion-that there really is reason for him to live-enables him to break free of Miboshi's hold. That is his epiphany, his point of understanding.

Soi experiences visions also: the brothel where she grew up, the vision of the glass mirrors, and the vision of the emperor of Kutou. I suppose the brothel is self-explanatory. With the glass mirrors I wanted to show Soi's preoccupation with how others see her. She is a woman, and with her upbringing more vulnerable to criticism than others. Nakago, as I said earlier, protects her from all that. The mirror scene shows Nakago stripped away. The voice (Miboshi) telling her that Nakago would never love someone like her forces her to analyze how she would appear to herself and to others if she did not have Nakago. Thus the disturbing insect stuff (gomen if you have a weak stomach). The emperor scene has as much to do with strength as with Nakago. The emperor I suppose is a weird mix of the men at the brothel and Nakago, who (on the surface at least) want Soi for what her body can do for them. Soi's comments that she is strong represent what she wants to believe (and what she really is), but of course Miboshi tries to refute that claim, telling her she's only good for her body and nothing else. When she is rescued by Tomo, Soi is still filled with doubts about her worth.

The section titles of chapter 6 are just the seishi's real names in Chinese and then in Japanese. I did that to make it clear who was dreaming what. It got a little confusing, even for me, when I was editing.

Chapter 7 brings everything together. The battle with Miboshi reveals Tomo and Soi's characters: their willingness to work together to accomplish a goal, their single-minded focus and their strength. The part where Soi stabs Miboshi and Tomo releases the illusion of their clothing is, I suppose, the climax, the high point, of the story. Soi finds that she is the strong woman she longs to be, and Tomo finds that there is reality beyond his illusion world, after all. That is what the fic has been building towards, really: the letting go of old ideas and the construction of new.

The end of the fic is kind of just tying everything together. No more character development...that's been done. Tomo and Soi have resolved most things-not all things. They are not totally comfortable with each other yet. I believe they are both intensely private people, and a week is hardly enough time to get to know each other. Besides, there is still a bit of rivalry over Nakago going on, as Tomo indicates. I'd like to think that with their deaths in the TV series, they took a whole hoard of hidden secrets they had never shared with anyone else.

But it's fun to imagine what these two characters would do in a situation like this. That's the whole reason for writing fanfiction, isn't it? After rereading The Crossroads, I think it might be too sappily philosophical at parts, but overall, I'm happy with what I wrote. It's been an interesting ride, and I'm glad I wrote it.

Tomo and Soi like comments at lordofmerentha@yahoo.com.