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Post by ᏞᎪᎠᎽ Ꮎf fᎪᏁᎠᎾms ミ☆ on Dec 1, 2020 18:42:05 GMT -5
i was thinking about this alternate route idea. what if hollyleaf shoves ashfur into the fire during the infamous fire scene instead of killing him days later? say, if squirrelflight kept ashfur's attention for much longer, hollyleaf could have snuck closer and shoved him into the fire below.
how would this change the power of three arc, going into omen of the stars? would lionblaze, jayfeather, and squirrelflight cover for her? tell the truth and get hollyleaf banished by firestar? would hollyleaf still run into the caves or not?
it'd be so interesting to see an AU where lion, jay, and squirrel have to WITNESS hollyleaf's snap and violence like this isntead of discovering she did the murder much later...
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Post by Skypaw13 on Dec 1, 2020 19:26:25 GMT -5
I mean, if she did that out of self-and-family-defense before Squirrelflight said anything about parenting, then Ashfur would be gone, Hollyleaf would be seen as a brave warrior, and life would go on as usual and we wouldn't have a climax or conclusion to the arc.
This is why seemingly stupid decisions are so common in fiction. Do the obvious thing and you no longer have a story.
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Post by ᏞᎪᎠᎽ Ꮎf fᎪᏁᎠᎾms ミ☆ on Dec 1, 2020 19:38:41 GMT -5
I mean, if she did that out of self-and-family-defense before Squirrelflight said anything about parenting, then Ashfur would be gone, Hollyleaf would be seen as a brave warrior, and life would go on as usual and we wouldn't have a climax or conclusion to the arc. This is why seemingly stupid decisions are so common in fiction. Do the obvious thing and you no longer have a story. there clearly can still be a story which is why i asked questions at the end of my post. what would lion and jay think about it? squirrelflight? would they see it as right? say it happened after squirrel said the thing about not being their mother, what then? it's not a dead end if you ask me. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 1, 2020 19:43:56 GMT -5
This is a really interesting idea!
I wonder what the outcome would be, if Hollyleaf did it before Squirrelflight revealed that they weren't her kits.
Would she end up telling them the truth anyway?
Would they pry, asking her what that was all about?
Or would life return to the way it was?
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Post by ᏞᎪᎠᎽ Ꮎf fᎪᏁᎠᎾms ミ☆ on Dec 1, 2020 19:52:09 GMT -5
This is a really interesting idea! I wonder what the outcome would be, if Hollyleaf did it before Squirrelflight revealed that they weren't her kits. Would she end up telling them the truth anyway? Would they pry, asking her what that was all about? Or would life return to the way it was? or what if squirrel is ABOUT to say it like "they're not my--" and everyone is shocked ashfur falls to the fires below and dies...that'd be so messed up and interesting to me. they'd all ask what squirrel was about to say and it'd be interesting to see how they'd go about figuring it out or getting squirrel to tell them, otherwise what if ashfur died for nothing? then holly would be in trouble. part of me thinks squirrelflight would be upset about it. even though ashfur was clearly a bad guy there, squirrelflight would probably disagree with hollyleaf's act of violence against a clanmate. idk how lionblaze would react since he's fought with ashfur more than once before then. |
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Post by Ṣanɗypaw™ on Dec 1, 2020 19:57:41 GMT -5
Well, we no longer have an Ashfur problem, but I still think that the secret would have been revealed.
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Post by Skypaw13 on Dec 1, 2020 21:59:59 GMT -5
I mean, if she did that out of self-and-family-defense before Squirrelflight said anything about parenting, then Ashfur would be gone, Hollyleaf would be seen as a brave warrior, and life would go on as usual and we wouldn't have a climax or conclusion to the arc. This is why seemingly stupid decisions are so common in fiction. Do the obvious thing and you no longer have a story. there clearly can still be a story which is why i asked questions at the end of my post. what would lion and jay think about it? squirrelflight? would they see it as right? say it happened after squirrel said the thing about not being their mother, what then? it's not a dead end if you ask me. I mean, yeah, if you come up with a new way to progress the story, then it works. But you're essentially asking "hey, if we got rid of the climax of the story, what would happen?" Well, you wouldn't have a climax anymore, and if you wanted a story, you'd have to come up with a new climax (in this case, another way for the Three to learn about their parentage that doesn't involve Ashfur's direct involvement). That's a fine line of thinking for an AU idea, but I personally can't see anything down this path that would be more interesting than the original version. It makes less sense to happen and absolutely murders your narrative structure. You're left either abandoning the story entirely by focusing on the arc's other plotline (at which point they may as well just be BrambleSquirrel kits for all the good that does) or coming up with a new way for them to learn the secret, at which point you may as well go with the original version, because it's more dramatic and makes the most sense. As for what happens if Ashfur dies after Squirrelflight says it... I don't believe Hollyleaf would do it. But Lionblaze might. I'm going to write my thoughts about that and post them separately. |
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Post by Skypaw13 on Dec 1, 2020 23:54:10 GMT -5
Also why the heck is this thread spoiler-censored? I thought we were all in agreement that discussing things that happened in 2009 don't require secrecy.
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Post by Skypaw13 on Dec 2, 2020 1:15:05 GMT -5
Anyway. I spent the last too long writing out an AU idea for Lionblaze pushing Ashfur off the cliff and into the fire below. Not gonna post it all because it be heckin' long, but the highlights: I could have been picturing it incorrectly this whole time, but when I read the scene I thought the correct scenery was that the family was trapped on a really high section of cliff, where any fall would kill them (which is why they all freak out when Jayfeather slips), and the branch led to another, higher section of cliff, too far for Squirrel to jump, that only then connected to the rest of the forest, so that's where Ashfur blocked them. Point is, there's two sources of danger: The roaring fire below and around them, PLUS the imminent certain-death fall. It doesn't really make sense for Hollyleaf to kill Ashfur immediately after the secret's out. Holly was rooted to the ground in shock at that statement, so if anything, the cat doing the pushing would be Jayfeather or Lionblaze. Jay probably wouldn't do it, getting close enough to Ashfur to do anything would be suicide for him. Squirrelflight wouldn't do it, she's remaining mostly calm and trying to get out of the situation with everyone alive. Lionblaze however...
He's the dumbest and most emotionally driven of the Three, but also the strongest. All three of these traits make it in-character for him to do the riskiest thing of his entire life and jump OVER Squirrelflight and tackle Ashfur off the branch, sending both himself and Ashfur plummeting to their doom. He may even consider it a noble thing to give his life for his family, and this would have suitable drama for a climax.
We see the buildup to that decision in Lion's POV, the end of chapter is him falling toward the flaming ground, and the next chapter picks up with either Holly or Jay completely numb with shock.
The AU branches here depending on if you're in the Prophecy camp or the Family camp. (Meaning the two camps of people where one camp believes Po3 and OotS should have been one arc, and the other camp believes Po3 was its own unique thing and the family drama was way more important than the prophecy).
If you're a Prophecy person, then Lionblaze miraculously survives the fall while Ashfur dies on impact and his remains get charred. This causes the secret about the Three's powers to also be revealed around this same time, so they have to deal with multiple secrets being revealed at once. If this AU was real, we would have also had the DF rising in the background up to this point. In this AU I'm imagining Outcast doesn't exist and Eclipse takes its place as Book 3, and the fire scene is the end of Book 4. So Book 5 is devoted to the Three learning their parentage and becoming social outcasts, and Book 6 is the DF battle.
If you're a Family person, then Lionblaze also dies on impact along with Ashfur. This causes Hollyleaf to snap earlier and far more violently, since she now has grief tangled with her fury and betrayal, and no targets to take it out on. This sets the the stage for her to be a foil to Jayfeather, resulting in the good sibling vs. evil sibling we've seen explored in other Po3 AUs, except now instead of Lionblaze being the neutral party, he's just... not around.
I really did try to not make the post too long. My notepad on this is like... 4 pages. I glossed over a lot of stuff, but this is I believe the most realistic take on the "Ashfur dies in the fire scene" scenario. |
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Post by Lizard 🦎 on Dec 2, 2020 2:01:26 GMT -5
just like "hehehe because i'm too wimpy to kill your kids i will tell everybody your secret and say i found it in your diary."
"no," says hollyleaf, shoving him into her fireplace and cooking him for dinner.
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Post by skyfallthewarriorcat on Dec 2, 2020 10:59:31 GMT -5
I think the better question is: Would Squirrelflight reveal her secret if Hollyleaf hadn't stopped Lionblaze from jumping over the burning bushes and fighting Ashfur?
It would be pretty dramatic it their fight ended in both of them rolling off the edge of the cliff and Ashfur dying from fall damage and Lionblaze living because of his power.
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Post by vectoring34 on Dec 2, 2020 11:07:42 GMT -5
The secret would be revealed later anyway thanks to Yellowfang and her signs. And if not then, then surely when they realize that Dovewing has powers and Hollyleaf does not. Given Hollyleaf's character, I could see her taking that revelation very poorly, perhaps being consumed by envy that her position was "stolen" from her. Given that the Yellowfang reveal would probably be happening not too long before that, I could see her cascading into a series of horrible decisions all the same, and with impunity too since she'd have been labeled as a hero for killing Ashfur. She might take on a far more villainous role, in that light.
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Post by skyfallthewarriorcat on Dec 2, 2020 11:10:59 GMT -5
Hollyleaf did feel like her position was stolen in the oots arc when she found out that Dovewing was the third cat to the trilogy. In fact, Hollyleaf never had the position in The Three group in the first place.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 2, 2020 11:26:11 GMT -5
Hollyleaf did feel like her position was stolen in the oots arc when she found out that Dovewing was the third cat to the trilogy. In fact, Hollyleaf never had the position in The Three group in the first place. I don't think she ever felt like that about Dovewing. She made friends with her in the end, remember? She felt left out, but I don't think she ever held it against her. In the end, she became friends with Dovewing and Ivypool, and got over it. |
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Post by skyfallthewarriorcat on Dec 3, 2020 13:13:26 GMT -5
im pretty sure she did for a few moments tho
when they met up
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Post by ᴏᴡʟ on Dec 3, 2020 15:09:32 GMT -5
Okay, so- I didn't actually finish this arc, because... I just lost interest, to be honest, but I do wonder if it would have solidified Ashfur as more of a villain or not, because it would have removed Hollyleaf from premeditated murder, and- as some have said- made it look more like an act of self-defense/preservation. I dunno- I feel like the death of a character can say a bit about what the author's intentions for that character are- how they're supposed to be seen in retrospect.
I dunno- it's an interesting question!
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Post by Vale on Dec 6, 2020 7:38:19 GMT -5
It would depend a lot on what the Erins had planned for the series - it could've changed nothing, or changed everything! It may have been that they all cover for her as he had tried to kill them all, but that Hollyleaf would still find out about her true parents and it all still happened as it did, just with Ashfur being dead earlier. That or they cover for her, and Squirrelflight and Leafpool come clean to the three (and Brambleclaw maybe) and while she still feels betrayed and that the code is a lie, she also has the comfort of her brothers who calm her enough to make a proper plan of action rather than acting entirely on rage and impulse. I feel like she may try to convince them all to leave, or simply leave of her own admission and become a rouge for a while. She may stay in the clan but be more standoffish and critical of the code. Personally I like the whole high-emotion part of her story, as sometimes people really do just suddenly lose control and do things they regret later on under the influence of adrenaline and emotion. I've done it and seen several people do it (obviously not as dramatic as trying to get someone to kill themselves or commit murder, but y'know).
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Post by Sagetail Productions on Dec 17, 2020 13:43:06 GMT -5
I think that Squirrelflight would keep the secret of the three being Leafpool's kits and not telling Ashfur. But, the whole plot of Sunrise would have to be altered.
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