Sandstone-Shadow
A chickadee in love with the sky
- Pronoun
- she/her
That sounds like a much better idea. And as far as Dave, it probably is the first chapters bothering me - in retrospect I enjoyed reading from his POV later on in the story. But the beginning threw me off, especially because very early on Brian seems more important than Dave. Maybe going a little deeper into Brian's character would help strengthen Dave's, as well; it sounds like, by the end of the interview, Brian is more inclined to raise the children instead of destroying them. If Brian had this nagging feeling all along and Dave scolds him for it, we could see more of Dave's feelings early on, which could lead to an interesting transition when he starts caring more for them. Which, as another thought, it would be nice to see more of the transition. There's a four or five year gap in which time Dave switches from dealing with this burden of the Pokémorphs to enjoying them and fighting for them. But the scene with Jane threatening to kill Jean works well for this, too.
Writing about Dave jogged my memory of what I meant to say before. In chapter 12, towards the end when Katherine pulls Jack aside, Katherine says, “And how does Dave know where they’re keeping Gabriel?” It makes sense that she's thinking it might be some kind of set-up, but it also sounds like a potential set-up for Dave to be a traitor. This is probably also what caused my problem with Dave - I was thinking he might end up a traitor. This could be an interesting twist if there's any doubt about whether or not he really still wants the Pokémorphs alive, but I don't think that's the case here. Still, see what you think.
So about Dave, I think that it's a combination of the shaky beginning and a sudden doubt in his loyalty (which could still make for an interesting character; it's just that it was a doubt that was never proven or disproven, so I was left wondering about and being distracted by it).
Ah, I see. I didn't quite pick up on that.
Glad I could help. =]