Furry Writers' Guild Forum

a sample of Captain Greymuzzle introducing some of his crew. Space Pirates

I am still not sure if this is a good way to do this, but i figured i could best intro the characters by having the Captain give a tour of the pirate ship to his captive “Visitors”. What do you think?

Space pirates
The misadventures of Captain Greymuzzle and his band of aging pirates.

Captain Greymuzzle strode forward leading his group of “Visitors” as he often called the captive bridge crew of the vessel they had just taken.
“Allow me to introduce some of my crew. This is my chief gunner Bang. He comes from the Boom clan on the planet Nitro. As you probably know that Nitro is a trinary system with it small moon Tri, the main planet of Nitro and the gas giant of Tall-u-lean. Unfortunately, due to an accident some years back with a hammock, he is only able to speak his name. Which he often does, loudly.
“BANG!” The group stepped back, their eyes wide as they looked at the wide eyed figure of a five foot tall slightly hyper active mongoose. The Captain smiled.
“These are my general deck hands Hoo, Wat, Wen, Wear, Wy and Hoa. They hail from the planet Tazmania in the Seti tau system. They are very good with their hands but be warned, they do bite. The group looked at the sharp black coloring and the white mark that each had on the top of their heads.
“These are my equipment officer, Ensign Dingo and his assistant Gopher. I have no idea how they do what they do but no matter what we need they seem to have it hidden in that locker of theirs.
“Peace!” Dingo smiled and looked over the glasses with the small round black lenses. His loud tidied shirt and the color of his Ferret fur made him look more like a tourist than an officer on a pirate ship.
“Like wow, man!” Gopher waved at them with his pinky and forefinger extended. With the way this Mere cat acted the captain kept expecting him to say “Dude” any moment.
The Captain frowned as a teenage female ran up and stood in line slightly bouncing at the very thought of being introduced as a space pirate. She stood almost six feet tall and the sharp white stripe on her long tail made all of them slightly nervous.
“This is Scamp. As yet I have no idea what she is still doing here.” The Captain gave her a stare.
“Being a Space Pirate! Sir!” She saluted, sort of anyway. Greymuzzle just shook his head and continued on.

it’s pretty good but it’s a little quick.

Well, it depends - do you think this fits with the story well, or do you think that it would be better for you to introduce them a little more naturally? And by that, I mean, having one of the main characters encounter a few of them while they’re doing something else?

If you think that this is a good thing to start from, try working on your descriptions a little bit more. Right now, I can’t tell if they’re on a space ship or on a boat that’s in the middle of the ocean. It might be implied that they are on a space ship because of the things that they are talking about, but you can’t give room for the reader to interpret something other than what you had originally intended.

Also, try working a few sentences like “a five foot tall slightly hyperactive mongoose” - they can be a little bit of a mouthful and can tire out a reader quite quickly. As an example, I’d write that line like this:

The group stepped back in surprise when Bang shouted, “BANG!” They stared at the short, hyperactive mongoose with their eyes wide, unsure of how to respond to his sudden outburst.
The Captain laughed, “See?” and then moved on to the next…

It’s not everything, but I’m sure that’ll give you enough to work on for now C: