Reviewer: It Was Me Signed [Report This]
Date: April 02 2024 12:18 AM Title: The Microlings

I wouldn't worry about any "delay" in the release of new chapters. You don't owe us anything, particularly not timely updates to your work. Besides, the moment you start feeling even the slightest sense of obligation is the moment this starts to feel like work, which it obviously shouldn't.

So I guess what I'm saying is that you don't need to apologize if motivation to write doesn't strike you as often as you'd like.

On the other hand, you've got three of the best stories on this site going right now, so if you feel the need to trudge through that lack of motivation, I won't complain!

As for the chapter itself, I was happy to see Jen and Kara pick up on the conversation they ended the previous chapter on. I think Jen needing to reiterate her point about Kara's people being the "baddies" displays just how much she's clinging to this newest excuse to push aside her guilt over her eating habits (and the squishing too, I'm sure). That's not to say she doesn't have a point, but her viewpoint does bring into focus a moral question that this story has posed for a while now:

Just how accountable should individual members of a society be for any evil practices of said society at large?

This is a tough one to answer. Several people in "Lilliputian" society have gone from ignoring Microlings to mistreating them to varying degrees since the latest queen ascended to the throne and placed height above all else (now that's how you do a pun). I think most people would agree that individuals should be held accountable for their own actions, but is there nothing to be said for the role leadership plays in shaping those actions?

Then there's people like Kara, who may not have mistreated any Microlings but also gave them no thought or made any effort to help with their plight. Is that evil in and of itself? If a good person does nothing, then blah, blah, blah, right? But again, if the forces guiding your society are telling you something (in this case, the value of the Microlings) it's difficult to break out of that mindset, let alone go against it and do the opposite.

If the highest authority figure not only tells you that something is okay but outright encourages you to do that thing, that's a hard force to fight against, not only externally but internally as well. People trust their leaders, even when they're psychotic (we've seen this each time Kara defended the queen's decisions, even when she suffered from them). Yeah, some people are just terrible humans, but government-sanctioned terribleness isn't always so easy to discern when you're in the thick of it:

"If our great, powerful, and supremely tall (which again, has been deemed a sign of power and respect in this society) queen tells that the Microlings aren't really people, who are we regular peons to argue with that?"

So I don't know how fair it is to judge Kara's society for their treatment of the Microlings. These people are led by an absolute monster (which this chapter illustrated beautifully once again), so it kind of makes sense that their sense of right and wrong would become messed up over time. At the same time, that doesn't change the fact that Microlings are constantly being abused and murdered, and I doubt blaming the monarchy would help the teeny tinies understand the reason behind such cruelty.

It's a really interesting question to consider!

Moving on from that tangent but sticking with Kara's role within it, I don't agree with Jen's conclusion that Kara is a hypocrite. I get what what the larger blonde is saying, and again, she has a point, but I think Kara's handling of her first actual encounter with Microlings in this chapter kind of shows that the smaller blonde's valuing of life never actually changed.

The first thing about the encounter that stuck out to me was that Kara didn't seem to have to overcome some sense of disgust or superiority in order to interact with Ania and Tomasz. She was surprised when she saw how small they were, but her initial reaction to seeing them was to reassure them that she meant no harm. Then she offered them food and was both attentive and concerned enough to notice that Ania was suffering. From there, Kara's natural inclination to help and just be an all-around good person took over.

So while we know that Kara remained loyal to the queen up until she the queen's insane policies led to Osmund's death, that societal programming never penetrated who she actually is as a person. She even apologized to the tiny couple for not helping their people up until now. I really think Kara ignoring the problem was a simple "out of sight, out of mind" scenario. She heard the queen's thoughts on the Microlings and never actually saw how they lived and what they had to go through, so it was easy to push that unpleasantness from her mind and focus on other things.

I personally don't think that makes her a hypocrite for wanting to stop Jen from killing and eating her people. I admit that this is slippery slope, though, and that there are strong arguments that could be made in the other direction as well. I just think that Kara not focusing on the suffering of the tiniest tinies is different from endorsing or even partaking in causing that suffering.

Also, seeing Kara interact with Ania and Tomasz was a lot of fun. After constantly hearing about how tiny Kara is even among her own people, seeing her as a 300-foot-tall giant put a unique perspective on the size differences between the three size groups.

It was also nice to see Jen still being super protective of Kara, even though she was mad at her. The way she watched Sarah when Kara made the offer (and that almost begrudging nod of approval) and had to be shooed off by Kara herself gives us an idea just how much Jen cares for her little Kara, especially when paired with the first half of the conversation at the end of the chapter. Little touches like that help really endear the reader to what's an already interesting and compelling relationship.

And it was pretty cute that Kara didn't even mind that she's going to be punished so long as she gets to keep being Jen's. Kara's dedication to her even pierced Jen's bad-ass exterior for a second. Admittedly, it probably helps with Kara's lack of fear of her coming punishment that, if it is indeed the same punishment that Kara received earlier in the story, she's probably into that!

It's hard not to feel bad for Sarah. She's going through such intensely conflicting emotions right now. She loved eating those soldiers in the moment, but it only makes sense that she would feel overwhelming guilt after the fact, given what we've seen from her so far. Not only that, but she's also dealing with hunger, and now she knows that all "Lilliputians" make for yummy treats, so chances are that she's going to eat more people, although I assume anyone consumed of her own free will from here on out is going to be an enemy soldier, someone she can justify doing it to.

I also liked that Sarah was concerned that Osmund's family would fear or hate her for eating their kind. She has become quite attached to all of them not named Gwen (and even then that's more Gwen's choice than anything), so it only makes sense that she would care about what they think of her. That they don't care at all, as well as Kara and Jen encouraging her, is probably going to gradually help get more comfortable with shifting her diet a bit.

I'm pretty sure Felicia has a size fetish. I've kind of picked up that vibe from her for a bit now, but between the detail she went into when describing what she would have done in Sarah's place and her casual assumption that eating her kind is "just what giants do" makes me feel more confident about it. So while I think Soren just likes Sarah because she as nice as she is hot, and I think there's a bit more to Felicia's attraction to the giant Latina.

You already know how I feel about Tarkus. I love seeing him lose it after that battle. Not only that, but rather than fear, he only feels hatred toward Jen. He isn't even afraid of the queen killing him for failing. His real fear is of losing. He puts everything he is into his role as a general, and winning is everything for him. I've said it plenty of times before, but he makes for a great villain, and I love how simple, yet nuanced he is.

Like I said before, we get to see just how unhinged the queen really is here. She's such a terrible leader, but most tyrants are. We've seen before how power hungry and gluttonous she can be, but now we know that she's batshit crazy! The more we see of her, the more this society makes sense to me.

Lastly, I've been waiting for our heroes to make a return trip to that little hamlet. I think seeing what the soldiers did there is going to be a big moment for several characters, so here's some speculation on that.

For Sarah, seeing that the villagers have been murdered will likely help her get over that last hurdle holding her back from doing what she needs to do. Coming across that level of evil will probably strengthen her resolve, especially if they're aware of why the soldiers killed them (I'm assuming they'll figure it out or maybe a survivor will emerge). This is exactly what they were trying to do to Osmund's family. That's surely going to awaken something in her.

I mentioned before that I was glad that we rehashed/continued that conversation between Kara and Jen this chapter, and this is another reason why. Kara has gone from not wanting Jen to kill/eat anyone to accepting it to no longer feeling sorry for Jen's victims (provided they're soldiers at least). But I think seeing this, seeing her one successful experiment in coexistence between her people and Jen wiped away because of the queen's policy is going to make Jen's words sink in deeper. I think Kara is going to start to believe herself that her people are, in fact, the baddies, that their society is inherently evil. She's likely going to think Jen is right. This is going to be a trying time for her, I think, and, if I'm right, I'm curious to see how you handle that and where you go with it.

Jen, I think, will have the opposite takeaway from the scene. I think seeing those people murdered, people whose only crime was doing what she asked to avoid being eaten, is going to make her feel things for the "Lilliputians" that she doesn't much want to feel. She's going to be upset that they were killed for no good reason. She's not going to view them as food or pests or baddies. She's going to view them as people, and probably get that same urge she feels toward the Microlings, that people like this need protected. Of course, if she starts to go down that road, she'll have to move past her latest guilt avoidance technique and have to deal with what she's done. That would be interesting, to say the least.

And I think Gwen will be affected by this as well, although I could see her going one of two ways. She could realize that this could have been her whole family and put the blame for Osmund's death where it actually belongs. Or, more likely in my opinion, she could see this as another example of what happens when you try to help giants, blame Jen for the whole thing, and go on to do something stupid in the chapters ahead. Either way, she's been creeping in the background for a while now, and I think we're going to see her role in this story increased by at least a little bit.

Or I could be wrong and this visit to the hamlet won't be the moment I think it is and all of the above speculation was just a waste of time. Wouldn't that be fun!