fanfiction

Ten years ago to the day, I started writing a Doctor Who fanfic called Turn of the Earth. I even made a whole lot of graphics/covers/etc for it, as fanfic writers did back then. You can see one up there; sadly it’s easily the best of the bunch.

Turn of the Earth was a gloriously jumbled affair about Mickey Smith and the briefly mentioned (in Boomtown) new girlfriend of his: Trisha Delaney. This fic was running concurrent to the actual series, so as Mickey got drawn further and further into the Doctor’s world, Trisha (who wasn’t even introduced til Part 3) took over as protagonist.

I loved Trisha so much. Russell T Davies, the writer of Boomtown, didn’t really have a lot to say about her. Just a brief description via Rose: “She’s nice. She’s a bit…big.” Mickey’s reaction was “She lost weight!” so I wondered if he actually liked this Trisha, and I decided he did. But what was she like? Why did she lose weight? What did she think of Rose? Did she feel like a rebound? And so on.

I don’t suppose Trisha meant more than a throwaway line to Russell T Davies, a quick plot device to show how far apart Rose and Mickey had grown (there’s even a cut line from The Parting of the Ways where Rose asks “How’s Trisha?” and Mickey says “Don’t care”) but once I started writing her, she meant the world to me. So did the people around her: Shareen Costello (another throwaway name you might remember from the series), her father, her mother, her brothers, her neighbours, and of course Mickey and Jackie. I wanted the Powell Estate and the people there to have lives, because (fairly or unfairly) I never really got the feeling Russell T Davies thought much of it or them.

I don’t know if I did or didn’t manage it, but I did give at least Trisha and Shareen lives, I think. They saw the world end – the Battle of Canary Wharf affected everyone, after all – but they survived. And they built a friendship that I think is actually the heart of the entire story, even though that wasn’t the intention at the beginning.

Stories about the people left behind on Earth while the adventure carries on someplace else are my favourite stories. (That’s probably why I latched onto Mickey so hard to begin with.) What does it mean, to be involved in the story, but have no control over it? Even now, watching the current series of Doctor Who, I wonder about Trisha and what she’s doing while the Cybermen invade, the dead rise, monsters stalk the street and so on. Canonically, Clara Oswald lives on the Powell Estate now. In my head, her and Trisha have met at least once, and liked each other. Shareen, who became a journalist in my story, has interviewed her at least once regarding UNIT. And they all lived happily ever after. No, they really did.

Turn of the Earth is on AO3 now (although obviously if you clicked the other link you’ll have seen that.) I thought it deserved to be there with my other ‘good’ fic. It didn’t even need much editing, to my surprise. Seventeen-year-old me apparently knew what she was doing. The only thing I took out was any reference at all to Trisha’s weight as a negative.

Writing meme: Marceline, Please forgive me for leaving you But it was something I knew I had to do I can feel the crown is making me evil And it’s the worst damn thing in the world to feel… “That barely even rhymes,” Simon said bitterly to nobody. I’m hurting myself and I’m afraid I’m gonna hurt you too So please forgive me for whatever I do- Musicians say the second hit is the hardest. Simon stared at his scrawled, mostly terrible lyrics for a long time. PLEASE forgive me- -Anonymous

*excited squeaking*

Please forgive me for leaving you
But it was something I knew I had to do

Okay! I love Remember You the song. I can’t beat that! So this is the same song, just…a different verse, I suppose. And, of course, it’s now remodeled as a suicide note. Because…

…well, I think Simon was pretty into music. Not just the Ice King, either, Simon. You can see his drumsticks in his bag throughout Simon and Marcy, and those drumsticks are one of the saddest things to me in the whole show. (I’m not exaggerating, they really are, for Reasons.) Course he’d leave Marcy a song, even a bad one. (‘Evil’ and ‘feel’ don’t really rhyme, after all. But I don’t reckon Simon’s heart was in the rhyming…)

And it’s the worst damn thing in the world to feel…

I love Sweary!Simon. I like to think everything we heard in Simon and Marcy was actually coming through Marcy’s seven-year-old filter and Simon was in fact constantly swearing, instead of ‘mother!-‘ing and ‘breadball’-ing, at everything and anything he encountered in the course of keeping Marcy safe.

I’m hurting myself and I’m afraid I’m gonna hurt you too
So please forgive me for whatever I do

Ah, the core of Simon’s character, in a way. How many times has that guy asked for forgiveness? Probably more than he needed to, considering the poor man tried so damn hard.

……Annnnnd lost anyway.

WHEN YOU SEE THIS, SHARE 3 RANDOM LINES FROM 3 WIPS.

1. Holmes smiled in that infuriating, though affectionate, way of his. “Ah, Watson, You need to polish up on your French. Grantaire – or grand R; capital R. An approprate moniker. And a clever man to adopt it. I do not think drink dulled his wits much, Léa.”

2. “Well, you were the one who shot me,” said the Master, in the manner of a petulant child. “You were a very very NAUGHTY girl, Lucy.” She said ‘naughty’ as if she was spitting out a tasty sweet.

3. “All my thoughts of war and glory, and I never considered the grief of my brother, or my uncle, or any of those who may have loved me,” Eowyn said. “It feels almost like a punishment now, that I feel what they might have felt, had I fallen. Alas for my uncle! And alas for the uncle my children will not know.”

evayna: (fic writing thing) Grantaire had a tendency to sprawl across his chair and onto the floor like drizzle on a cake, so it was just a matter of time before someone tripped over him. 

Grantaire had never seen Enjolras do something as human and normal as fall over (he was, however, absolutely alone in that) so he just snorted and stayed where he was. Enjolras afforded him no more than a dirty look. Bossuet poked him with his foot.

“My guests are leaving their unwanted items on the floor again, I see,” Madame Hucheloup said. She had a broom in her hand, and she made a gesture as if she was going to place it squarely on his face.

[for the five-more-sentences-of-fanfic meme!]

Ooh, I should do a 2014 fic roundup too. There weren’t many, but-

A Light Troubled By Smoke – Les Mis/Doctor Who crossover, featuring Combeferre and Martha

The Long Dark Winter – A Frozen tale

The Teenage Girl – Spider-Man visits Gwen’s family after her death. [ASM verse]

The Empty Frame – Featuring Sam Wilson and Harry Osborn [Also ASM verse, but the bits of it I’m pissed with]

Ghosts – Clara Oswald before, during and after the events of Death In Heaven.

THE CLARAFIC IS FINALLY DONE

Title: Ghosts
Rating: PG13
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Clara Oswald
Also starring: Danny Pink, the Maitlands, Courtney Woods, Kate Stewart, Martha Jones, Mickey Smith, the Child
Summary: The ghosts, dead and living, that haunt Clara Oswald.

Read on Ao3! or

(more…)

Anonymous asked: talk to me about boromir

elenilote:

notbecauseofvictories:

Ten Things About Boromir the Bold That Never Made It Into the Red Book of Westmarch

I. His strongest memory of his mother was the smell of the sea she carried in her hair; how dark and tall she stood, looking towards an east Boromir would ever only long for in her honor.

II. Boromir did not ever doubt that he was loved. He was the first son of Gondor, swaddled in a walled citadel and rocked in Pelennor’s arms. He did not question why his father’s love was like stone, nor why his brother looked to him like he was the highest point of the ramparts. They were a city, and how else was a city to love?

III. For Boromir’s fourteenth year, the master of hounds promised him a pup of his own—One of Huan’s own line, the man swore, As befits a prince. What Boromir received, however, was the runt of that spring’s litter, a wheezing, stumbling thing that Boromir stubbornly nursed with a cheesecloth dipped in milk, then fed meat from his own plate.Bellas, he called it, and ignored any who dared laugh.Bellas never grew taller than Boromir’s knees, but she was strong and stubborn and loyal—for three years, Boromir went nowhere without her shadow at his heels. Bellas slept at the end of his bed; waited patiently during Boromir’s lessons; loped after his horse when he went riding.Boromir was seventeen when Bellas was killed, her neck broken by an orc who had stumbled into their hunting party. She had put herself between her young master and the terrible interloper, and afterwards, Boromir had carried her in his arms all the way back to Minas Tirith.He buried her beneath a sapling tree on the slope of Mindolliun, and wept where no one could see him.

IV. Faramir looked east, and dreamt of great waves. Boromir watched him, heart heavy in his chest.

V. He had been in love with—well. He never said.

VI. Boromir was ill at ease in Elrond’s house, feeling too rough with travel, and heavy—all of Gondor on his shoulders, the knowledge that Faramir’s fine speech and strange visions might have meant something here, where Boromir, Protector of the City, did not. But he burned when they dismissed Gondor, his fingernails biting into his palms when the strength of Men was so questioned. (He had not seen any Elves come to Osgiliath’s defense, nor heard of any wizard-craft that kept the Corsairs from their brazen pillaging of Langstrand and Belfalas. What had these mighty peoples done to battle back the Shadow in the East except sit in their cool green palaces and speak in riddles?)

VII. He liked the Hobbits best, even after. They reminded him most of his own men, with their stubbornness and light-hearted complaints, their love of food and pipe-smoke and story. Three of them had left behind the whole of their world, to walk into darkness beside just one, and—yes, Boromir could respect such brotherhood.

VIII. (Aragorn remembered when Boromir was only a child, rosy-cheeked and happy to leave his mother’s side, to follow Thorongil around the citadel burbling in some tongue only Denethor and Finduilas could decipher. It was strange to meet the man that child became, to stand at a height with him, to wield a sword at his side, to listen to him speak of peace for Minas Tirith like other men spoke of lovers.It made Aragorn feel very old, an ache deep in his bones that had not been there before. Careful, he wanted to caution the man, as he had once cautioned the child. Reach too high and you will fall.)

IX. One rainy night, when Boromir was keeping watch over the sleeping Fellowship, he sketched it out in his mind—the streets he would lead Aragorn through, the hidden corners of the palace he would show to Merry and Pippin, the great gates of the city whose craftsmanship he might justly boast of to Gimli. How Minas Tirith, that shining city, would chase the sorrow from the Fellowship’s faces, might shield them, might give them rest.The rain dripped down his neck, cold, but he was gone to Minas Tirith—This is my home, he imagined himself saying to his companions, his brothers. This is home, may you always be welcome.

X. His last thought was of Faramir.(Brother, little brother, I—)

oh my heart

The Long Dark Winter (FROZEN fanfiction)

A tale from Arendelle. Based roughly on the idea that Prince Hans, had he succeeded in manipulating and murdering his way to the throne, might have actually made a fairly good king (by nineteenth-century standards) once he’d gotten there. Which somehow just makes him even more unnerving.

Warnings: Hans wins, everybody else dies or suffers. (Sorry.)
Main characters: Original character

(more…)