I've edited around 15 separate chapters in Dead Inside (a few of them getting full rewrites) to clean up some Kairi things. I've finally finished with all the major chapters in Part 1, which means I can upload them!
There are some things between Part 1 and Part 2 that won't line up until I edit Part 2 as well, but I have to edit around 10 chapters from Part 2 all at once because it's an Entire Sequence that needs to be edited, not just two chapters, as I previously thought.
So here are all the major Kairi edits made to Part 1 of Dead Inside. LET'S GO!
What is this?
Like I said, an edit to around 15 chapters of Dead Inside Part 1. (I've also tacked on an extra chapter to the end of Dead Inside that gives a basic rundown of which chapters have been edited / why, though you'll find much more detailed and interesting stuff here.)
Why?
Kairi related reasons. Largely I feel like I could have done better with her role in, well, Dead Inside as a whole. I can't totally rewrite Dead Inside, but I can edit the Kairi chapters already within it to make them feel a lot better than they used to.
Instead of not really caring that her friends all left her / patiently waiting for them to return, Kairi cares. She's mad, she's pissed as hell, she's bitter she's in a really bad spot honestly. But it feels really good. It feels so much better than "oh I miss them so much but it's alright, I'll wait" because hEEEEECK TO THAT!!
These edits boil down to, well, I guess 4 reasons, but there are two major ones
1) To, like I kind of just said, make Kairi actually care about the fact she's been left behind, have her react in a way that feels a lot more like her, to me. She's bitter as hell now, but honestly, it rules
2) Make other characters (namely, Namine) actually acknowledge she exists? Like, Namine now thinks about Kairi thruout Dead Inside instead of kind of just thinking about her. I mean, I still have to edit a lot of other chapters in part 1 of Dead Inside for this specific reason, but the chapters among these edits lay down the groundwork for this.
Which chapters?
- - > ch8, ch15, ch20, ch21, ch22, ch24, ch30
- - > ch34, ch46, ch56, ch87, ch96, ch97
(Chapters 30, 87, and 97 Extremely Rule imo. 8 and 46 are also pretty good now too.)
If you want to see me yelling about these edits on tumblr, you can check out the "di bloggin" tag on my personal tumblr. Specifically, for these edits, the chronological pages 4-11.
Basic changelog here
In depth changelog / commentary under the cut
The difference in this changelog vs the basic changelog on tumblr is here I'm going to talk about a lot of the whys I did what, along with bring up a few of the much more minor and probably unnoticeable changes I left out of the basic changelog.
Cool!
(If it has a * that means I think it rules)
*Chapter 8 - Kairi has a nightmare
- the first half of this scene with Joseph and Riku was edited to remove obnoxious Namiku shippy stuff. I'm doing a lot of that too, and it's one of those things I'll pick up when I go through Dead Inside chapter by chapter again, instead of picking out and editing all the Kairi chapters
- the second half is where things start to rule. Initially this was a scene with Namine and Kairi on the islands at night for some reason, and Kairi brings up the "what if Sora comes back and he's not him anymore" fear.
- Kairi still brings up this fear in the new take, but now she has a nightmare first, and the nightmare rules.
- the scene after it also rules. I mean. I could go into really explicit detail concerning what's different (they aren't on the beach, they're still in Kairi's room, Namine says different things, Kairi actually feels scared, I could go on) but basically it's the Same Concept But Now Better. A lot of these edits are like that.
Chapter 15 - Letter Talk
Sora/Riku scene
- Initially it was like "Riku didn't care that his face was bandaged" but then I went no he should care so now he's picking at him, Sora scolds him for picking, and he flinches, but stops. That's new
- there was like three paragraphs here dedicated to Riku explaining he's got an ability to analyze every detail in a scene because Replica but it?? it was bad. the flow was bad. it was just plain bad, so I cut it
- Joseph gets eager about fighting 14 (the traitor Vexen Replica), and initially 29 whacks him over the head to get him to drop it. I decided That Sucked, because sure let's just have a parental figure hit their kid, that's cool. NOT. IT'S NOT COOL. So I changed it so instead 29 just pulls Joseph back. (This, and other things about the 29/Joseph relationship, will also be edited when I go through Dead Inside chapter by chapter again)
Kairi/Namine scene
- mainly edits to the dialogue so it sounds more like Namine and Kairi should sound.
- completely rewrote the letter itself for this reason (instead of being "oh Sora I'm so worried about you, please come home~~" it's "SORA IDK WHERE YOU ARE BUT YOU BETTER GET YOUR BUTT HOME RIGHT NOW" which is, more Kairi)
SHAD SCENE!! (I forgot it ended w/ a Shad scene)
- tweaks to it in general. The content is all there, nothing's really been changed, just reworded
- I did change the "oh Kairi's the girl Sora likes" to "oh, Kairi's Sora's best friend" because Obliterating Romantic SoKai is also on my list of things I'm doing for Dead Inside edits.
Chapter 20 - Namine's Kidnapped
- rewrote the kidnapping scene to account for Namine not wanting to just leave Kairi behind, but being kind of forced to. It's not the best thing, but it's better than pretending Kairi doesn't exist, like, the original version did.
- instead of going "oh I'm a friend of Riku's I can take you to him" 17 phrases it as "I'm a friend of Riku's it's urgent I need you to come help right now"
- Also now Kairi's here
- 17 comes off as more of a threat
- shifted Namine arriving in CO to ch21 to make room for the kidnapping from Kairi's pov. Because, that's a thing to be covered. That should be covered. That was covered. It's cool. ((The ending makes me cry but Boy Do I Love Pain or whatever))
Chapter 21 - Namine arrives in CO
- Namine scene was moved from ch20 to here
- Riku scene may have been edited for "tone down Namiku reasons" but it was minor and I don't remember if I did
- Sora scene was edited for general "make the dialogue sound more like the characters I know" reasons. Shad's dialogue sounds more like Shad would actually sound, same w/ Sora and Joseph in a few places
Chapter 22 - Namine wakes up
- definitely toned down some Namiku stuff here
- now Namine wakes up and goes "WAIT A MINUTE, KAIRI, I LEFT KAIRI BEHIND" because, well, again, it's better than her just literally forgetting Kairi exists once she arrives in CO lol.
Chapter 24 - Another "wait, I should get Kairi" along with Sora/Namine convo
- first scene, where Riku/Namine talk, has, like I said, another "I should get Kairi" from Namine, to which Riku responds with a (kind of bullshit) excuse.
- Sora/Namine scene was edited so it actually read like they were friends instead of the "oh we knew each other but we never really talked much" junk. It's not like that. The main four were friends. What was I thinking back in 2013. Why did I think Sora and Namine didn't interact, why did I think Namine was only close to Riku, help.
- removed another obnoxious Namiku, This One Featuring Her Smacking Him, And I'll Obliterate Every Instance Of That.
- actually jk, I mean. I am going to look at every time Namine smacks Riku and either a) remove it or b) make him react like he legitimately would to that??? Though I think I'd be better off removing it. Idk. maybe one of the scenes I'll edit to him freaking out and Namine going "OH OOPS SORRY I'LL NEVER DO THAT AGAIN". Depends on how many instances there are lol.
((I think about my plans for early book 5 stuff and remember how it was going to be a Recurring Thing that Riku would start to say something and to get him to stop Namine would just casually whack him and I burst into literal flames.))
Chapter 28 - in which Namine and Joseph have a point of complaining interest
- the first two scenes remain unchanged
- the final scene where Namine asks about her sketchbook and Other Things was
- toned down obnoxious Namiku
- reworded dialogue so it sounded better, yanno, that thing. now it sounds more like what I think they would actually say, now that I know them better and everything
- Namine asks again about Kairi, Riku starts to spew an excuse but is interrupted (to be fair, he was interrupted from whatever he was saying in the original version, too)
- OH IN THIS CASE THEY TALK ABOUT KAIRI INSTEAD OF BEING CUTESY, which is fair, and fine, it's fine. I don't thiiiiiiink I'll regret removing / toning down all of this Namiku stuff because my goal is to make it less overbearing and obnoxious, it's not like I'm deleting every instance of Namiku being cute ever. Also if I look back at something and it makes me gag on reflex then, probably, it should be changed, yanno??? Yanno.
*Chapter 30 - Selphie!!
- There was Kairi/Selphie scene in here initially but it was short and, honestly, kind of bad. (Kairi's like "oh I don't care Namine's gone, she's with Riku now, which is where she wants to be" and frik that. Also Selphie acted like she could remember Sora and Riku and Namine and haha no she wouldn't be able to.)
- Anyway, now we have a new Kairi/Selphie scene, in which it's just?? It's all around better. Kairi yells, Kairi's upset, Selphie can't remember. It's good. There's a lot of ways it's different (because, it truly is basically a brand new scene) and there's no reason to sit here and line out all of them because I'd basically line out the entire scene lol.
HONESTLY THOUGH I JUST!!! I love this scene so much because I love?? Everything that happens in it?? I love Kairi yelling and being bitter. I think it feels so great for who she is and what she's going through. She's not taking it passively, she's raging and she hates it but there's nothing she can do to change about it.
Bitter Kairi is a gift. It's so much, better, for what she's going through. It's also extremely fun to write.
Also I got to explore Selphie's character in a post FF8 mindset and honstly I feel? I feel like Selphie got the short end of the stick, when it comes to her role in KH. All Selphie comes off as in KH is annoying, and, she's not like that at all in FF8? So I was able to write Selphie as Kairi's friend, and, just in general, in a way that portrays her as she actually is and not as she appears in KH.
Her having mechanical skills, for the record, is because that's totally a thing in FF8? She's obsessed with machinery and trains and is the go-to person for pilot of the Ragnorok. So, even if I can only portray it in FtPverse as "she always carries a screwdriver" it is a thing. And it's important to me.
So, yeah, ch30 now rules.
These are other things I edited in it:
- The Namiku thing at the end of the chap was edited to include another "I should get Kairi" convo, in which this time Riku gives probably the most legit excuse he got.
- Also the Namiku scene initially had this whole convo about all the times Riku's been hurt for some reason and I??? I didn't want that anymore. So I deleted it I heckin deleted it.
Chapter 34 - yet another "I should get Kairi" convo
- Namine just telling Riku I should go get Kairi is a constant thing, will be a constant thing now. Well, a kind of constant thing.
- Other than that, the meltdown scene was edited to remove a gross part, but was otherwise untouched.
Chapter 45 - I just rearranged things here
This was initially a Namiku scene (specifically, a meltdown scene that was their POV of what happened in literally the previous chapter in Shad's POV). Looking over it, I couldn't see it being any different from any other meltdown scene I wrote, and decided to cut it.
I didn't cut it for, like, no reason tho. This was so I could move Sora stuff that had been in ch46 into ch45, because the new ShadKai scene that was going in 46 was really long and I figured would be best if it was in a chapter by itself.
Other than the rearranging, no edits were made. Though, in the future, I will have to edit this because there are some HB gang dynamics that are bad. BUT I'LL WORRY ABOUT THAT ANOTHER DAY!!
*Chapter 46 - ShadKai Meets
This was another scene fully rewritten to be completely new, due to the original scene being a) short and b) bad.
Specifically, Shad's crush on Kairi came off in overbearing and extremely gross ways, so I wanted to make it so it was not. Also, I figured Kairi meeting an invisible stranger should probably happen differently, and from her POV.
Hence, the new ch46.
(You can get a chapter tag for this rewrite here)
Shad's side:
- he meets Kairi and now doesn't pine over how beautiful she is because that's gross
- he also doesn't crack about how Sora doesn't deserve her, because that's unnecessary (AND ALSO IF I'M HONEST HE WOULDN'T ADMIT TO HISMELF TEN SECONDS AFTER MEETING HER THAT HE HAD A CRUSH ON HER LOL)
- now his crush comes off in quieter, subtler ways. it's for the best. especially considering I can look at the ShadKai chapters and dynamic as a whole and not want to barf??
Kairi's side:
- instead of being like "oh, sorry, I can't see you :((" and saying nothing else upon meeting Shad, this invisible stranger she can't see, she, I dunno, reacts like a normal person probably would??
- she wonders whether or not someone is actually there, asks him at least twice if he's not a fucking hallucination, demands to know who he is and why he's invisible and tries to pressure him into giving her a name.
- all around, this whole scene was basically rewritten. there are a lot more differences but I'd be here for a while covering them, again. It rules though because it does what I set out to do extremely well, and it's much more interesting to read / makes more sense
The rewritten chapter 46 is not, by far, my favorite edit amongst all these chaps but I still think it's extremely good because it did exactly what I set out to do w/ it.
Also, reading ShadKai things and not wanting to barf is a really good feeling?? Especially since ShadKai is so important.
Mainly it's not that I'm in love with the things that happen in this chapter, but I'm extremely proud of how they turned out, how I handled them, what it looks like now. It's really extremely Top Notch work, and I love it for that.
Chapter 55/57 - more rearranging
Like the first ShadKai scene, I wanted the second to be in it's own chapter. This chapter didn't have much done, but I moved the bit where Riku and Namine talk about the Repair Program from ch56 to here, so it's just one continuous scene instead of being broken up.
The ShadKai chapter was originally in ch57, but I moved it to ch56 for pacing reasons, while shifting the contents of ch56 to ch57. Specifically, the start of 56 got moved to 55, and the end of 56 moved to 57, and now the ShadKai chapter sits in 56. Easy peasy.
Chapter 56 - the second ShadKai scene
This one initially had Gross Shad Crush things, so I had to tone those down, and also there was this whole thing about how "Kairi has no anger in her because ~pure light~" and that was dumb, so now it's gone.
- Now we have Kairi's POV because Kairi's POV is good. She muses on why this relationship is even, a thing
- we keep some Shad POV crush hints, they just aren't as obvious or gross as they were before.
Here we get into why ShadKai is a thing that works. It's because Kairi's lonely as fuck and bitter as hell. Shad's literally the only person she can talk to right now who she can talk to. And, I mean, Shad's there because he's got the doki-dokis, but Kairi lets him stick around because she's deseprate for the company, and that's a thing, and it works.
*Chapter 87 - Kairi and her dad (again)
Yup. I had to re-rewrite this one, too.
(You can find a chapter tag here.)
The basics of the original chapter 87 are still touched (the school dance, Kairi missing her friends, Ren knowing about other worlds) but they're touched in different ways. The main reason was because I had to edit how Shad messed w/ Kairi in this chapter (going from an anger route instead of a guilt route, because Kairi's anger/bitterness/resentment is much more readily available compared to any kind of guilt about letting Sora down) and then kind of base the scene around that.
But I did a lot of other things too.
- Ren now actually reacts like he should when he realizes he's forgotten Sora. It's not just "wait a minute, how did I??" It's extreme horror, because anyone realizing they've forgotten someone extremely important in their life would react that way.
- we still bring up the spell, but probably in a better way this time
- we touch on the fact Ren has only been mayor for four years (HE'S NOT REALY OLD ENOGH TO HAVE BEEN MAYOR FOR LONGER)
- we touch in dialogue vs parenthesis infodump from that Riku spent late TTH / early FtP living with an old fisherman who was gone on a fishing trip for the entire time. (He spent the start of TTH bunking in Kairi's house for a while, definitely at least until Namine showed up.)
- REN REACTS TO FORGETTING NAMINE TOO AND IT'S GOOD!
- Kairi physically feels what Shad's doing to her. There's the sickness in her gut, the itchiness on her skin (which is Kairi's tell-tale sign that darkness is nearby, she gets itchy.)
- Kairi yells and Ren yells and everyone's yelling at the end but it feels so good it feels so good I love it so much
- I MENTION NOW, BEFORE LIKE HALFWAY THROUGH ATR, THAT KAIRI HAS HER WALLS LINED W/ NAMINE'S PICTURES!!!! hell ye
- bitter Kairi rules. raging Kairi rules. Kairi feeling sick to her stomach and grumpy eating rules. this whole chapter rules. it rules it rules it rules it RULES
- AND THEN, THE SHAD SCENE??? THE SHAD SCENE ALSO RULES
- He's not cocky and proud, he's in disbelief and he's ecstatic. He's so excited to have done this thing that should have been impossible and it genuinely feels so good. This is some of the best Shad content I've written in a while. I've overused the word rules by now but it rules. It's so much better than it was before, it's great, it's amazing, I love it.
This chapter is so much better than it was before and it's so good and I'm so happy,
Chapter 96 - A quick Shad thing
((Chapter tag here))
- This was edited largely because, I think I already mentioned it, but I looked at Shad's "ha, all I need to do is make Kairi lose faith in Sora and I'm set!" and I went "wait does she even HAVE any faith in Sora left" so I had to tweak it so Shad took that into consideration.
- there was a Shad Crush hint in the original that came completely out of nowhere, so I removed it in favor of a more subtle take on hints towards his crush (which I did in like every other chapter lmao)
- a soshad hint made it in but shh
- shout out to worry for me because you bet your bottom I ended up using that style of parenthetical arguing with oneself here.
*Chapter 97 - this chapter rules
(tag here)
- like 96, I had to rearrange it so it wasn't "make Kairi lose faith in Sora" it was "crush the tiny bit of faith Kairi has left"
- I also decided to put this in Kairi's POV because It Didn't Need To Be In Shad's
- Shad's intro scene was tweaked because a) she doesn't have a desk nor a desk chair b) him watching her sleep is yuck? c) now I can say "he didn't want to be in a position where he could see her face becuase he wasn't sure he could go through with this if he saw the pain on it" and thumbs up emoji
- Now we get a bomb-ass dream sequence. I love dream sequences that are more than just dreams, and, I think this rules. I think what I did rules. I love the idea of this being a recurring dream that gets interrupted, of Shad arriving in that blank, smiling silhouette (definitely stole this imagery from a vocaloid pv, ijdk which one), of a voice speaking to Kairi that's all around her and pressing in on her. (Note how Shad's dialogue isn't in italics, unlike the rest of the dream)
- we get a look at the absolutely terrifying thing that is A Kairi Who Feels Liberated By Lack Of Worry About Sora. this will be explored more in part 2. (ch96/97 kind of lead into the "yelling" sequence, aka Kairi leaving the islands aka the first 20 chapters of part 2, all of which need to be edited for this reason and others)
- Shad's ending scene features him being more upset / less obvious about his crush again.
~ ~ ~
THAT'S ALL THE EDITS!!
Next on the agenda is batch 2 Kairi edits (her leaving the islands / yelling sequence / that one ShadKai meeting around ch124 for continuity) - I have no idea when those will be done.
After that I go back to editing the rest of Dead Inside, tackling things that still make me mad but at least make me significantly less mad. And also are edits that won't need to be edited All At Once like these Kairi ones because there won't be any huge things that won't line up.
So yeah, that's everything!! I hope you enjoyed these edits because they rule.
See you later tonight / tomorrow with liner notes for the new and improved Dead Inside OSTs.
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