on the reasoning that prompts are fun

Jul 06, 2019 00:30

Sometimes, people tell me random things and then stories happen. Like that time a friend told me to write a Doctor Who stapler monster. Stuff like that ( Read more... )

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Evidently Deviltown, Part 6 bendingsignpost July 18 2011, 05:04:52 UTC
“I keep forgetting to ask,” Jackie says, sweeping out the kitchen after cutting a neighbour’s hair. “How’s Teetee doing?”

Rose glances up from her book. She’s been rereading all her old books, has to in order to remember what the hell Freckles is talking about these days. He’s breezing though her bookshelf way too fast. “Sorry, who?”

“Teetee whatsits,” Jackie says.

“Right, that’s helpful, Mum.”

“Well, I don’t remember what the number was!” Jackie huffs.

Something clicks. “You mean Freckles?” Rose asks.

“Rose. You don’t have to go and name it.”

“Mum.”

“It’s like what Pamela downstairs is always telling her little girl: Don’t play with your food.”

“Mum, Pam’s daughter eats mice.” She can’t seem to hide behind the book the way Freckles is able to. It just doesn’t work for her.

“It’s the same principle. What’re you sitting over there all quiet for, anyway?”

“It’s called ‘reading’,” she says.

“Haven’t seen that since before you dropped out of school,” her mum replies promptly. “Well before. Excuse me for being confused.”

There’s a long silence. Without the telly to cover it up, it’s much too obvious.

“How’s Mickey?” Jackie asks. “I haven’t seen him around in a while.”

“I see him during my break now,” she replies. “He’s fine.”

“You should bring him ‘round.”

“Why, d’you need him to fix something?”

“Yeah, dryer’s on the blink again.”

“Yeah, okay.” She fishes out her mobile, texts her boyfriend. They’ve both got work off tomorrow. Home improvement day it is, then. She tells Jackie and Jackie’s thrilled.

She stays on the sofa until her mum heads out for an early morning with the girls, possibly not to be back until after next sunset. She stays there, not quite twitching, until the door closes.

She’s up in a flash.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hi,” he says.

“You are so wrong,” she tells him.

“It’s a blatant continuity error!”

He’s right, in the end, and by the time she slips out of his room, it’s practically noon.

Mickey fixes the dryer, they snog a bit, and it’s all very nice.

Except, well.

No, it is.

It’s all very nice.

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Re: Evidently Deviltown, Part 6 mylittlepwny July 18 2011, 05:11:35 UTC
LISTEN, OKAY.

LISTEN.

You can't just...write this, and make me feel things, and make Rose a vampire and the Doctor this I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT and have it all be so horribly adorable with the tentative warnings and then the realization that she's not who he thought she was and then that slow building of whatever it is they're building and NOW SHE'S REREADING HARRY POTTER AND ARGUING WITH HIM ABOUT IT AND SNOGGING MICKEY IS VERY NICE EXCEPT. EXCEPT.

I fucking fainted when she had to feed on him, HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SURVIVE THE REST. oh man. you are the worst.

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Re: Evidently Deviltown, Part 6 bendingsignpost July 18 2011, 05:14:24 UTC
Wow, I was seriously just about to get to bed. Still going, because it's been one hell of a day, but yeah, you go read the rest now, 'kay? Imma gonna sleep.

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crazy explanation (1/2) because lj comment size is too small bendingsignpost July 18 2011, 14:53:10 UTC
Look, sometimes, it's just a compulsive thing I do, okay? My brain made connections. It does this. Ask vyctori, she watches my brain explode at least once a week.

I would like you to see what you made slam into my brain with your prompt.

All my friends were vampires
I didn't know they were vampires
It turns out I was a vampire myself in the devil town

Question: How do you not realize that everyone is a vampire?

Answer: It's normal.

Question: How does a world were vampires are the majority of the population survive without everyone eating each other?

Answer: New Earth remix, recast the Flesh from medical experimentation to a blood source. But, oh wait:

I was living in a devil town
I didn't know it was a devil town
Oh lord it really brings me down about the devil town

It's a horrible situation! That Rose didn't know was going on! Except how could she not know?

Answer: Because no one would let such crazy shit go down unless it was stressed across the board to be okay. If the Flesh only get defended by animal rights workers/volunteers, and then they get tangled up because of the definition of animal doesn't quite include these genetically engineered creatures. Who, like the Flesh on New Earth, are designed to not be truly alive. Except, um, no, clearly that doesn't work, but it's the most widely beheld falsehood in the world. They're part of the machine, so they understand the machine, and all that jazz.

Obviously, this situation is made worse when the blood drinking is the vampire's sole source of food and it only makes sense anyway. Naturally, I went straight to that. Plus, it gets freakin' adorable writing someone who doesn't know how solid food works. Rose gets to be the alien one.

Question: Why would there be solid food about if the vamps don't eat it? (No one would bother to grow stuff just for the Flesh.)

Answer: Vamps are the majority, but there are were miniorities, and obviously you need more than one, and I adore me some werefoxes. Solid food is for weres. (Which means Rose has simply not noticed the big bags of "Flesh Food".)

Actually, no, that last bit just made sense in hindsight. Really, I wanted an excuse for werefoxes, which I adore, which I stole, but it's all fanfic, so hey. (Besides, I've seen a freakin' fox running through London in the middle of the day, so werefoxes in the city make so much more sense than werewolves. Werewolves prefer suburbia, they need to run around, okay?)

Backtracking now:

Question: How does Rose realize she's living in a devil town?

Obvious answer: The Doctor!

Question: How does he show her?

Painful answer: Heartbreak!

More detailed answer: By proving her wrong about all of her expectations about the Flesh, which means he has to be one. (Except that decision was actually more like "He's been genetically engineered to have two hearts to be better to feed on! *story pulls an Athene on my skull*") So, by being one of the Flesh (there's seriously no singular term of the Flesh, because that would imply they're individuals - have some creepiness born from difficulties with syntax), the Doctor completely goes against stereotype. Not only does he articulately speak, he's multi-lingual, craves mental stimulus and has an innate sense of compassion.

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crazy explanation (2/2) because lj comment size is too small bendingsignpost July 18 2011, 14:53:39 UTC
Question: How does Rose wind up having him around?

Answer: Jackie buys him as a factory reject, a failed prototype. As one of the early attempts for a binary vascular system, he's biologically stable, but his blood pressure is a bit weird and not good for packaging purposes. He's still industrial grade in terms of recovery times and production, which is very fortunate. With great strain, he could probably keep an entire family alive for a couple years. With one person, he could go indefinitely.

Icky problem: How the hell to keep Jackie from feeding on him.

Solution: That blood pressure issue. He's too weird for her.

Resulting question: Why would Rose stick with him, then?

Answer: She's raised on frozen packs, he's her first that she's ever had to bite herself (when she was tiny, her dad would let her suckle from his bites, he was a right-biter like her, a concept borrowed from Buffy). She doesn't know he's off. Madly enough, this now means she's been ruined for anyone else.

Also, Rose bites on a different side from her mother partially because it's all symbolic but mostly so they don't have to have overlapping bite marks on him because that would just be weird in a way that I am not comfortable with, even enough I am apparently comfortable with a lot of weird shit.

Random things that make me so happy:
-TT40-10 is the TARDIS number plus his incarnation.
-The Doctor is still off the grid because the Flesh aren't considered people.
-Good dawning/birthnight/every piece of vocabulary I get to adapt/invent.
-He loves Hagrid because Hagrid takes Harry away from the horrible people and gives him squishy horrible food and loves him terribly, and that sounds wonderful.
-Putting a fantasy novel in this meant instant complications, which meant thinking, which meant solutions and world history and I'm not sure what level of tech the world is currently at, or what year it is, but this used to be our world, okay?
-Bananas confuse Rose. Blood-only vamps means confusion about solid food and a complete lack of cooking finesse. They don't even own plates, hence the shoebox lid. Their "kitchen" is the fridge, the microwave, and the sink. Yes, I realize this is pretty crazy, but it also cuts down on waste and garbage disposal.
-Vamp fangs are like snake fangs, folding into the mouth when shut. None of that hanging over the lips nonsense.
-Bio-sociological correctness with each type of were. ("Werecreature" is traditional but actually an offensive form. You want to go with "wereform", because when the person changes, they're in a different form, they're not a creature.)

oh man. you are the worst.

Lies, you love me. I am, however, a bit off in the head.

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Re: crazy explanation (2/2) because lj comment size is too small mylittlepwny July 19 2011, 05:45:51 UTC
You're my favorite.

With one person, he could go indefinitely.

~

He loves Hagrid because Hagrid takes Harry away from the horrible people and gives him squishy horrible food and loves him terribly, and that sounds wonderful.

I HAD BETTER BE SEEING WHAT YOU DID THERE.

I should be responding individually to every single thing about this comment (and now you know how I feel about lj comment limits EVERY TIME YOU WRITE SOMETHING) (how dare they try to control our enthusiasm), but fuck if I can do much more than sit here in awe of your creative process. I don't make this many notes when I write a research paper, let alone a fic. TELL ME YOUR SECRETS.

or don't. just never ever stop utilizing them.



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Re: crazy explanation (2/2) because lj comment size is too small bendingsignpost July 20 2011, 01:53:32 UTC
He loves Hagrid because Hagrid takes Harry away from the horrible people and gives him squishy horrible food and loves him terribly, and that sounds wonderful.

I HAD BETTER BE SEEING WHAT YOU DID THERE.

With the Hagrid bit, he doesn't mean her. That's why he doesn't really finish that thought. At this point, he's fully behind the dream of getting your letter to Hogwarts.

I don't make this many notes when I write a research paper, let alone a fic. TELL ME YOUR SECRETS.

Compulsive connection making.

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Re: crazy explanation (2/2) because lj comment size is too small mylittlepwny July 20 2011, 02:30:10 UTC
OKAY FINE

I admit the Hagrid thing was a leap. But don't think I didn't notice you conveniently not mentioning the feeding one person indefinitely thing.

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Re: crazy explanation (2/2) because lj comment size is too small bendingsignpost July 20 2011, 02:32:50 UTC
Oh, shush.

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