Crimson Dawn: Eight Years Later

[Sinder]

I'm reading my old story right now.

So stupid. So very, very stupid. 

I'm sure that when I was 14, it all sounded very impressive, but now...

So stupid.  

Yeah Burkey, I said it.

EDIT: I hate this story. Hate it SO MUCH. BLEARRRGH.

[cartoonking10749]

This may not be any of my business. But I'm quite surprised with you.
Crimson Dawn, in my opinion is the greatest SPC fic ever.
But hey, we have different opinions I guess.

[NPC]

What the hell is a Crimson Dawn?

[Judith_Sparrow]

I loved crimson dawn! Granted, going back and reading it now, it is a little... unpolished, but its still a great fic! Wish you'd gotten around to writing the sequals.

[cartoonking10749]

Here, Here.

After reading this masterpiece, I was hungrey for more.

What I love about Crimson Dawn is:
1) The drama/seriousness of the story. Very powerful, tense & beautiful.
2) The use of Sinder's fan character, Jonas. Not too dominating and not to mention cool in the right way.
3) The bad guys are more darker, destructive & at many times unforgivable. Adds more to the drama.
4)My most element of the story, the relationships. They're just beautifully done and there is no shortage of romance in sight. Speedy & Polly were done very well, if not passionately (there was even their wedding in the story), but in my opinion, the best effort done was the pairing of Guido & Francine. It's this story that has made me a GuidoXFrancine fanatic. Yes, this pair rules!!

So there you have it.

[NPC]

I've never heard of this.

Where can I find it?

[Guido64380]

I'm reading my old story right now.

First post dude.

[NPC]

I'm reading my old story right now.

First post dude.

Woops. I got my skull handed to me.

[Sinder]

Necropost! 

Crimson Dawn was originally intended to be the first chapter in a trilogy of stories called "The Endgame Saga" which would serve to wrap up the Samurai Pizza Cats "plot" once and for all, ending the war against the Big Cheese, and bringing a more definite note of closure to the series. Unfortunately, the second and third Endgame stories were never written; I started high school immediately after Crimson Dawn was published, and with the increased workload (not to mention the stress), I didn't have the time to devote to writing that I once did (the first story was written almost entirely over the summer of 1998, meaning I was able to work for three or four months without interruption).

Over the years, people have asked about new chapters, or wondered about what direction the story was going to go in. I once provided a summary of future events to a fan, but upon recently discovering SteC's Crimson Dawn fanart, I realized that people might still be interested in the story--if not reading it for the first time!--even after almost a decade. So, for the curious, here's a brief explanation of how things were going to turn out.

Samurai Pizza Cats: Mirror, Mirror was the second chapter of Endgame. Work was actually started on this one, but the early draft was lost after a sibling deleted it (which rather dampened my enthusiasm for starting over from scratch). The story dealt with Jerry and the Big Cheese having survived the events of Crimson Dawn and cloning the SPC and Bad Bird from blood samples left behind at the scene of a battle that took place in that story. The cloned cats would be physically identical to the originals, possessing the same strengths and weaknesses, but mentally trained and conditioned by the Big Cheese to be ruthless killers--his idea of what real "Samurai" should be. This was going to be a very dark, emotional story in which the Dark Pizza Cats impersonate the real SPC, wreaking havoc across across Little Tokyo, tarnishing their reputations and turning the people against them. The clones also upset the cats' personal lives: in a very physical fight, Polly nearly kills Dark Speedy after slashing him across the face with her claws and beating him within an inch of his life with a frying pan. This confrontation exposes the fake cats, who don black suits of armor to reflect their evil nature.

The resulting fight between the two evenly-matched teams levels much of the city, and ends only when Guido is temporarily "killed" (he has a near-death experience in which he meets Lucille's spirit, who then returns him back to his body). In the interim, Francine, consumed with grief, experiences a complete nervous breakdown, sobbing in anguish at Guido's side. The Dark Pizza Cats look on in confusion and puzzlement; they are unfamiliar with emotions like love and sadness, since the Big Cheese did not include them in their brainwashing, and so they do not understand Francine's sorrow. Speedy makes a speech about how being a samurai is about protection, honor, nobility and sacrifice; samurai do not take lives, they save them. Realizing that Speedy is right, the Dark Cats are overcome with remorse. Believing themselves to be monsters beyond forgiveness, the clones attempt to atone for their sins by committing suicide. Upon waking up, Guido is troubled by his brush with death, and proposes to Francine on the spot, rather than risk waiting until it is too late. The chapter ends with their wedding, and a final scene at the graves of the redeemed Dark Pizza Cats.

The conclusion had a working title of The Great Hunt (with the tagline "The Hunt Is On"), but I believe this was later changed to Final Judgment. This final chapter had the Pizza Cats actively looking for the Big Cheese, trying to strike him before he can launch another surprise attack. Their search turns up empty until a nuclear missile is detected heading for Little Tokyo. The Cats destroy the missile (I don't remember precisely how this was done as a lot of details for this story were always sketchy, but I think they either blew it up or crashed it into the ocean) and trace it back to its launch point: Prisoner Island. The Cats sneak onto the island to discover that the Big Cheese has captured the local "prisoner" population and is using them for slave labor to construct a large-scale factory. Inside, they find that the Big Cheese has managed to salvage the Supreme Catatonic from where it crashed in the ocean. He is not only repairing the robot, but also upgrading it with a variety of weapons. It is not yet operational, but it will be soon, and when it is, not even the Pizza Cats will be able to stop it. Speedy makes the difficult to decision to destroy the Catatonic rather than have the Big Cheese use it for evil. Brute force won't work, so he instead activates the robot's self-destruct mechanism. The Cats free the prisoners and evacuate the island. The Supreme Catatonic explodes, completely destroying Prisoner Island and killing the Big Cheese. With the villain defeated once and for all and able to experience genuine peace for the first time in their lives, the Samurai Pizza Cats retire to settle down with their new families, and enjoy the rest that they have earned. The End.

So, there you go.  In hindsight, it's probably best that this ended up not being written, as I'm sure it would've been every bit as contrived and pretentious as the first chapter was... but believe me, when I was in junior high, it all seemed truly epic!

[SteC]

So Big Cheese lived through the first story, eh?  would certainly have a hard time as a pizza cat, for sure.
I couldn't help thinking about how the rest of the story would turn out after reading Crimson Dawn.

Thanks very much for sharing the full storyline with us, Sinder!

[BurkeWorld]

I've never heard of this.

Where can I find it?

Just thought I'd come in here and have a good chuckle at this.

Burkey

[Daisensei]

I don't understand why was Sinder so negative in the first post. I have to confess that didn't read all the text (it's very looong), but liked very much the parts I've read. It's really different from the SPC series, and even more serious than KNT (sometimes Crimson Dawn is creepy). Nevertheless it introduced a new point of view about the SPC, and the how the things went after the comet.
I didn't like the fan character Jonas Miles, in my opinion he doesn't fit in the SPC universe, even if we consider Crimson Dawn as an alternate universe from the aired cartoon.

[BurkeWorld]

I don't understand why was Sinder so negative in the first post. I have to confess that didn't read all the text (it's very looong), but liked very much the parts I've read. It's really different from the SPC series, and even more serious than KNT (sometimes Crimson Dawn is creepy). Nevertheless it introduced a new point of view about the SPC, and the how the things went after the comet.
I didn't like the fan character Jonas Miles, in my opinion he doesn't fit in the SPC universe, even if we consider Crimson Dawn as an alternate universe from the aired cartoon.

We are our own worst critics when it comes to our own work.

I'm the exact same way, it's just something built into our psyche I suppose.

Burkey

[Helios]

I loved crimson dawn! Granted, going back and reading it now, it is a little... unpolished, but its still a great fic! Wish you'd gotten around to writing the sequals.

Me too. I thought it was an excellent fanfic - the best one I've ever read. A pity you're not going to continue it (maybe someone else might).

[Blackcat]

This may not be any of my business. But I'm quite surprised with you.
Crimson Dawn, in my opinion is the greatest SPC fic ever.
But hey, we have different opinions I guess.

Don’t worry, creators are always like that, my first fanfic, even if it was read by more than 100 people and was popular, looks like crap to me five years later.

[Judith_Sparrow]

Yeah, I look back on my old writing (fan fic or not) and its like 'Ouch, did I write that? And people *liked* it????

[KausTeyandee]

ive read Crimson Dawn, it was in my opinion probobly the most interesting Fanfics of SPC/KNT ive read thus far, the elements of action and adventure are well provised, seriousness was taken into consideration for this story, plus the relationship among the characters added on to the quality of this story

[DarkMatter_Zero]

Don't be so hard on yourself Sinder, I loved your Crimson Dawn and your Jonas character and I actully was going to use them in sequal idea of my own but never got around to writing it....I preatty much suck at writing down my thoughts in any kind of order.

Well this is my ideas it preatty much invovled in a nutshell....

A demonic emperor that Jonas was seeking to destroy has finally reawoken in the Nyanki's world. This Dark Emperor as I have dubbed him preatty much wants to do what all evil villians want to do destroy/control the world. The Dark Emperor and his minions, prove to be more powerful then Jonas bargined for and he and Nyanki have to find anicient dorment powers in the form of the Crests of the Four Anicient Gods divided up in to Earth(Jonas), Fire(Polly), Wind(Francine), Water(Guido), and their two guardian dragons Light(Speedy) and Shadow(BB), each invovles cool new armor, weapons, and powers. But the dark emperor corrupts the power of the shadow dragon turning BB against Nyanki trasforming him to Yami Karamaru/Dark Bird. They must find and master these new powers to try to defeat the Dark Emperor; and save BB from himself, before he blankets the world in death.

Thats preatty much a small rundown of my ideas, their is alot of other details that I could go on about for probibly hours, much invovling Jonas and my idea of his true identity, his true face, and a relationship he finds himself in heh.

But yeah Sinder your story inspired all that, so dont be to harsh on yourself ^^ Crimson Dawn FTW!

[Blackcat]

Ah, why we always want to kill Guido? In my case I wanted him to do some kind of sacrifice, to get in the way and save Speedy life or something…and I am Guido fan^_-

[AsterCrow]

Well said.