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Okay, NOW Panic! by Boz4PM	13 Review(s)
Ninithil	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/28/2006
Oh don't leave me hanging. There is a little part of me that still believes that the mugging wasn't random. It was too soon after a certain other incident, but I could be wrong. :) I'm must admit, I'm quickly becoming an addict to this series. I chack back daily for new chapters. Author Reply: I'm sorry for taking so long to update! I really hoped to have the next chapter up far sooner, but chapter 34 is now up! I'm glad you have enjoyed it all so far, and I'm afraid that, no, the mugging was entirely random. Penny (as ever) was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Fire	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/26/2006
Wow, now this is what I call a very, very powerful chapter. You have brought up a subject that is unfortunatly too often occuring now a days with all the fighting going on all over the world. I think Penny's way of handeling was very good, she snapped Haladan out of it, and she was stubborn enough to tell him everything she knows about it. Her advice was sound and I do hope she got through to him and that he will go and talk to someone. And just on an different piece of the story, o boy is that thief lucky the gards showed up because pissing of two rangers and an elf is not a smart thing to do. I love the way Lindir acted, it was like: Hey don't mess with my human friend or I'm gonna rip your heart out ;) I mean you don't want to piss of an elf, any elf. Author Reply: Thank you. I am not sure Penny did snap Halladan out of it, though, as she says herself. Most flashbacks only last a limited period of time and, as the person comes out of it, they are in a strange 'in-between' world where they can hear stuff but it's kind of far away and slowly reality comes back to them. So by that point Halladan could possibly have heard Penny and the birdsong, but it would have been hard for him to focus on - the main focus would have been the flashback. If she had not been there it's like he would have come out of it in much the same manner and in much the same time. She may have helped a little, perhaps. And, yeah, the thief had a very narrow escape indeed. ;)

Bodkin	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/26/2006
Just for a moment at the end of chapter 32, when everything went dark, I was thinking 'No, Boz wouldn't do that to her audience. Penny is not just about to wake up and find it was all a dream caused by having been mugged in a dark London street...' But you had me worried for a moment! And there was a mugger who was glad to be carted off by the rozzers. He was in far more danger surrounded by Penny's friends than he will be in jail. Halladan is becoming more and more rounded as a character - and Penny is revealing more of herself to him - lots of things she has kept shoved away in that locked drawer. She did well in her response to his distress. Probably very familiar with her Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon. Poor Halladan - he must have thought he had seen enough not to shatter under the stress of battle, but everyone has a last straw. He does need to talk - and to listen. Fingers crossed Penny's reaction to his flashback will make a difference to him - we'll see. Author Reply: Thanks, Bodkin, and sorry to have alarmed you! lol There was debate between me and the betas as to where to end that chapter and we plumped for there (my first suggestion) only because I knew the next chapter was going to be posted within days - otherwise I would have had it up till the start of the rescue which would have worked but not quite as well IMHO. I'm glad you think Halladan is becoming more rounded as a character - it was one of the main aims of this chapter. And you are exactly right: Penny's knowledge on such things, while limited, does come from studies of WWI and that gives her enough to have some understanding. It's interesting, when I've discussed this subject with Americans, or Americans have posted reviews, they all (and quite understandably) refer to the Vietnam War. As a Brit my history/cultural references for PTSD, or 'shellshock' is WWI, even though at the time it was largely unrecognised or misdiagnosed. Speaking of Wilfred Owen and Seigfried Sassoon - have you ever read Pat Barker's "Regeneration"? Superb book. It's about when both were invalided out with shellshock from the trenches and actually met while up at a hospital for shellshock victims (Pitlochrie in Scotland). It's fiction, but does have that meeting in the book (Sassoon is a main character) and the cases of shellshock are based on actual cases files written by the doctors at Pitlochrie.

Pearl Took	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
This is a wonderful chapter. A very powerful chapter. I hope the seed she planted in his head and heart grows into something good and beautiful. :) Author Reply: Thank you. It is a chapter/scene I have been working towards for some time, and I'm glad you feel it worked enough to describe it as 'powerful'. :)

NESSA	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
Oh my, I have wept, held my breath, mourned and become desperately hopeful in these last two chapters. Halladan needs help so badly. I am glad Penn-ii was there in the story to see and say as much as she has. I wish I had had the courage (would you believe I was afraid to review?) to have told you all the things I have felt and thought throughout the reading of this tale. Should I go back and review them? Would it be helpful? I do not want Pen-ii to leave the Elves. As you can tell, my heart is Elvish as well as my Penname. Author Reply: Well, I wanted her to see this, not only so I, through her eyes (as it were), could convey the damage the War has left behind not just on the land but on the people and the soldiers themselves, but also because for once she can use her modern knowledge to some effect - it's not working against her for once. It is always a pleasure and of great interest to read people's comments and reactions to chapters or scenes, and I would love to read yours, but please do not feel obliged to go back through chapters and review. Perhaps if you ever re-read you can make comments then? Whatever you decide, I will look forward to reading anything you wish to say whether about past or future chapters. :)

Daynawayna	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
I LOVE IT WHEN I'M RIGHT!!! LOL!! And OMG, Lindir!! I've never seen an elf so pissed off! Don't mess with a woman, and certainly don't mess with His Human! ::giggles:: Very well done. Another amazingly phenominal, emotional, intense, deep and rich chapter Boz. You never cease to amaze me. I love the fact that Penny got to see the flashback and was there to 'help' him through it. I think these two will be close friends for years to come (as long as years may allow). Of course I would love little better than to see them together, but I'll take my small victories where I can. ::wink:: I do hope Halladan speaks to Aragorn or someone... even Penny (but he won't talk to her about war, I'm sure), and soon. He is too noble a man to be destroyed by this. Please let him talk to someone about this, let him air his grief and begin to heal! Author Reply: As one of my LJ icons says: "NEVER upset a warrior elf!" ;) For all elves are beautiful, etherial and fun-loving, they are also great warriors as the tales show: they must be terrible indeed when in a rage or full battle mode and that's how I always write them, even in my utterly AU comedic stuff. Thanks so much for your comments - I'm so thrilled this chapter has moved you so. As I've said in response to other reviews: it was time Penny found her background and knowledge from modern life was actually of some use and benefit. It may be Halladan ignores her completely, but at least someone has said it to his face, and he cannot pretend she doesn't know what she is talking about.

Inglor	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
As I read the scene between Penny and Halladan, I got a familiar feeling. It was like watching a soccer (football) player take the ball end to end and score or a baseball player hit a grand slam or some other feat of consumate skill and talent come to fruition. A scene that will play over and over in the mind of the watcher (in this case reader) long after the game (or story) is over. When it is done and the goal scored or home base stomped, you can't help but sit back and say "Wow". And Penny's story has several of those running on an endless loop in my head. Author Reply: Thank you for that compliment - it means a lot to me. I am amazed and thrilled that a few things I have written have had that effect on you, and thank you for telling me so. :)

el_esteleth	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
waves again grins Halladan and Penny are so funny when they argue. I'm glad Halladan got rid of icky thief dude. I'm really enjoying this story and the situations you put poor Penny in. evil grin Thank you for sharing the story. I always pounce on new chapters now when I get the update notice. :) I can't wait for the next chapter. Es. Author Reply: Thanks for taking time out to review - I'm glad you enjoyed the chapter! And, yeah, I enjoy sticking Penny in these situations too: I am such a cow to her at times, I really am! lol

Mopsy	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
This just gets more amazing with every chapter... Author Reply: I am glad you think so. Thank you. :)

Shemyaza	Reviewed Chapter: 33 on 6/25/2006
I understand that you were trying to deal with the subject of PTSD in this chapter and it was a very brave attempt. Despite the fact that the phrase was really coined during and after the Vietnam war, it's still not something that people in the world around us want to acknowledge. Yet as war has always been with us, so has PTSD, albeit by other names - shellshock, battle fatique, combat stress....cowardice. It was also treated a number of ways. Send the sufferer further foward to the edge of battle in the hopes of shocking them out of this affliction. Send them behind to be treated in the hospitals and even shoot them for desertion. In the modern military, the treatment is to keep the soldier with PTSD with his unit so that he's surrounded by people he knows and is therefore to occupied to succumb. In reality PTSD is an insidious thing. It usually hits the sufferer long after the incident. Long after the sufferer has gone back into normal life among his/her friends and family. It usually lies dormant for months and years, unless the incident that caused the trauma is so horrific that it's too close to the surface to be buried. Clinical Definition: PTSD is a normal reaction to an abnormal situation. I know. I have PTSD. I have it because I served in a war in which I was put in the position of having to take life in order to save my own and it haunts my dreams. PTSD never goes away. Even with years of counselling the best you can hope for is that you can find the ability to deal with the flashbacks and make them into nothing more than memories. But once you have it, it's there for life. I understand from the way you wrote the chapter that Halladan was suffering the equivalent of a PTSD flashback. There have been many stories about veterans coming home, having one of those horrible flashbacks while asleep and waking up to the fact that they are throttling their wife or partner. However the events that precede this are not entirely as you have written them. Flashbacks occur during normal day time, when one is awake. During the flashback you are not aware of anything around you. A smell, a piece of music on the radio or even a word from a conversation can trigger them off. The first sign that a veteran is having one of these is that they will stop suddenly in the middle of wherever they are or what they are doing. Their eyes will become blank and they are unresponsive to anything in the real world around them. This is because that smell, that music or that comment has taken them away into the very situation that distresses them. For them, they are no longer in that place with you, they are in the other place. To the observer it is as if they are waiting or straining to see something that no one else can see. This is called 'the ten thousand yard stare' and it's the look that many Vietnam veterans had when they returned from the war. If you will, think of it like having a video playing inside your head of the same horrific scenes over and over again. The video has no stop button and is on constant replay. The memories, smells and sights are so strong that they instantly take you back. During that time you recognise no one and nothing around you in the real world. Only the world of your deep memory exists. During that first period where he's being taken back into the video inside his head, Halladan would have stood still for a very long time and been totally unresponsive to Penny. He would not have had the presence of mind or ability to warn her to get away, since his mind would instantaneously plunge him into the ten thousand yard stare of a flashback. He may well have drawn his sword or assumed an attitude of defence once the flashback was under way, since in his mind, he was responding to an enemy, but usually whatever combat occurs, occurs deep inside his mind. To Penny he would look as though he was just standing stock still with no expression on his face or in his eyes whatsoever. PTSD sufferers do not know they are doing this. They are often not aware that they are responding to the flashback until they come out of it and begin to respond to the world around them. Flashbacks during the day rarely lead to violent behaviour such as threatening someone with a weapon. The sufferer comes out of the flashback and seems to jerk into reality. Eventually they will respond to the stimuli of the world around them, yet a good fifteen to twenty minutes may have gone by. It's frightening to watch, but only in very rare cases does a daytime flashback result in threatening behaviour from the veteran. The violent behaviour stems from many things, survivor guilt, frustration, extreme anger and a fierce desire to be a protector of their family even in situations where the family don't need protection. PTSD sufferers are angry, ashamed of themselves and their self esteem is low. The switch that takes us from angry to calm doesn't work and no more is this more evident than during the night when they dream. Dreams take them deep into their nightmare world and its a place their family can't go or even begin to comprehend. They have memories so shocking to them that they feel they must protect the people around them from them, even when those people don't understand that the sufferer perceives they are in some kind of danger, yet they can't talk about these things. The flashback is a trigger for buried feelings. The night time dreams are the place where those feelings can be released into a virtually real time incident during which they relive the memory much more actively than during the blankness of the flashback. In the depth of sleep the daytime vigilance is relaxed and the anger is released and once the sufferer starts to climb their way back to consciousness they will often react violently to the person next to them. Usually their spouse or patner. When there is no spouse or partner, like in my case, I used to have the dreams and then walk in my sleep. I was divorced and living with my two sons and it wasn't unusual for my son to hear me get out of bed and he would find me at the top of the stairs gripping the handrail so tightly that my knuckles were white. I don't know where I was going, I wasn't even aware of getting out of bed. PTSD is more common among people who have no prior exposure to extreme violence bloodshd or torture, who endure it for a while and then go back into normal life. People who have lived their lives in peace and then are exposed to these things have no coping mechanism set in place. Soldiers who become innured to those things usually do so because it's all they know of what they do and believe it or not, your pysche can become attuned to it if you do it long enough. These soldiers, and I have met many of them, don't suffer from PTSD because to them the violence and killing is part of their norm. Soldiers like this usually can't settle back into normal life and constantly seek danger and violence. Many become mercenaries because its all they know and it's the one time they feel completely alive. I have talked to many of them and they admit it. Halladan was brought up to war and killing from being tiny. He would have seen horrific things from the first moment he became a warrior and went into battle. The whole of his life would have been given up to that way of life, just as his brothers, father and mother would have been accustomed to it. They would have known nothing else, therefore the likelihood of him or them suffering from PTSD would be a lot less than the average person living a relatively peaceful life. That's not to say that he wouldn't have had memories and felt anger, but his mind would have long since found a coping mechanism, an ability to switch off when seeing or doing violent things and therefore the PTSD triggers would not have been as strong as someone who was taken from a world of peace into a world of violence. I am sorry this is so long and I haven't even scratched the surface. Its just that as a PTSD sufferer I know that there is an inability of those around you to understand the world that you're plunged into without even a second's notice. It's a complex condition and requires years of counselling from people who are trained to deal with the complexities. Halladan would not have talked to Aragorn about it because Aragorn would have been too close and the whole crux of the condition is that you want to protect those around you from the horrors. It takes a trained counsellor and many years to help you to help yourself. There is no quick fix and no one else can do it and the victim will only do it if they want to. Getting them to admit that they need help is the first step. I wanted to try to give you an insight into the mind of someone who has been there, done that, wore the tee shirt and wrote the script. Author Reply: Thank you for your reply, and certainly do not apologise for length. Your comments are informative and very helpful and I thank you for taking time out to explain the matter and give your personal insight. Firstly, I must express my sympathy and sorrow that you have suffered such a condition - though I know nothing I can say will be adequate. I am so very sorry that you have had to live through such a situation and are stiff suffering. Secondly, I apologise if you feel I have got aspects of this slightly wrong. I have long had this idea in my head and I have researched PTSD (and particularly that stemming from battle experience) as best I could as to the condition, how it manifests and what (if any) cure there may be. I realise it is long term - even the studies I had done of the First World War and literature based around it from many years ago made that clear. Indeed even as a teen I was introduced to the idea: one of my favourite characters from detective fiction - Lord Peter Whimsey - suffers PTSD throughout the books and those are set in the twenties and thirties, indeed one of the reasons why his batman is such a rock to him is that he was also his sergeant in WWI and can understand and help (such as anyone can help) when Whimsey has his night terrors. To my mind, Halladan has this problem only because of Hirvell's death, and not even because Hirvell died (though that would have been deeply traumatic for him), but because of the manner in which he died. Yes, he is used to war, to blood, horror and mayhem - heck he saw his father cut down but that did not send him over the edge. It was Hirvell's death that did it. I hope to try and discuss this in more detail at a later stage, but you have to consider some of the factors leading up to Hirvell's death I have already tried to show with Halladan: when their mother died, even though he was barely a teen, he took on himself a role of 'responsibility' to help his father bring up his two younger siblings. He has always felt responible for them as the eldest brother, but magnified due to his personal circumstances. When Halbarad died that would have magnified tenfold. When Hirvell was killed, therefore, he lost someone younger than him (always shocking, though, as you say, such is war and Halladan would understand that), but not only that he lost his brother, the 'kid he was meant to look out for'. There will be a huge amount of guilt and self-reproach in his response to Hirvell's death that he would not carry even for other deaths, not even his father's: there is guilt involved in PTSD, but this guilt is far greater because of the personal circumstances (as well as due to the particular circumstances surrounding when Hirvell was killed, which I hope to explain, though I may never find an opportunity). However, as I tried to imply in the previous chapter, Hirvell died in a particularly brutal and horrific fashion. It is all these things combined that mean Halladan, trained warrior though he is, is finding it hard to cope. And it is precisely because he is a trained warrior and should be able to cope (so he thinks) that he reacts as he does in this chapter after the flashback has faded. Penny has little deep understanding of PTSD. She has read about the First World War, but that's about it. She can only go by her half-memories and make suggestions. She has no doubt others, such as Aragorn, Gandalf, Elrond and Galadriel will have a far better understanding of what to do and how to help. She can surmise counselling - so talking - may help ease the severity, but I think even she knows that there is, as you say, no quick fix and it may be Halladan will never be completely healed of this. I should also point out that Penny is correct in her assumption: she did not 'pull him out of it'. As you also say, flashbacks slowly die away of their own accord as the sufferer finds reality slowly feeding back into the flashback loop. If I have got the actual moment of the hallucination incorrect, my apologies. As I say I tried to research it as best I could and did find some examples (admittedly rare) of when such a thing occurs - as you say it does happen but is rare. That said, I also needed a way to convey both to Penny and the reader what was happening without forcing Halladan to have to explain himself, and also the timeframe is compressed a little - these are moments of authorial licence, and I'm sorry if you feel they marred the whole. I did have someone I know who has had flashbacks read the chapter and they felt it was bang on, but they are not a sufferer of intense PTSD due to war, so perhaps there lies the difference. For what it is worth, and as yet I have no way of conveying this to the reader but I hope to if I can, I had the idea that normally Halladan's flashbacks are not like this - if they were someone would have noticed and said something to him or done something about it long ago. This is also why he is so shocked and appalled that he drew his sword (and I hasten to add he did not draw it on Penny, nor threaten her with it). Normally they are, as you say, relatively calm if odd and at times lengthy affairs, easily covered over or explained away by Halladan, or perhaps, if they occur in the presence of those who themselves get such moments, understood and not referred to. There were a number of factors at work in this moment, not least his realisation that he was back on a point on the Pelennor where he had fought and not returned to since then. It usually lies dormant for months and years, unless the incident that caused the trauma is so horrific that it's too close to the surface to be buried. Which is exactly what has happened to Halladan in this instance: Hirvell's death was particularly horrific and Halladan has had to stay in Gondor close to the scene of it and prior battles, including the one where he lost his father. Hirvell is not just any soldier, or even any Dunadan, but his younger brother and he watched him die in a truly horrific manner. I thank you for your comments, and appreciate you taking the time to point this all out. I hope my reply has explained my process and thinking behind this scene. If I can find a way to rewrite aspects of it in light of your advice, I will certainly do so. Author Reply: Oh, and I want to add: I would like to post your review and my reply on my forum on FF.net and on my LJ, if that is alright. I think it only fair that readers know both my process for this scene and how and why I made the choices I did and where I have taken some licence in my representation, even if it is based on some truth (that some flashbacks can become violent, or animated in very rare cases). I will do this not simply to justify my reasoning, but also so people know the actuality of PTSD since it is, I would agree, important given it is a still misunderstood condition. Author Reply: And by 'actuality of PTSD' I mean: 'that it is usually somewhat different from how I have portrayed it in this scene, which is in fact a non-sufferer's representation of a rare occurrance'.

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