Year-end Fic Post! :D
So, I didn't do one of these posts last year, mostly because I didn't write much last year. I wasn't really on LJ much last year, as I wasn't really in fandom then.
This year I have been writing. A LOT. I posted 16 fics and about 114,800 words in 2012. That’s not counting WIPs - I have more than 10,000 words of the Christmas fic written that hasn’t been posted yet.
Neal Caffrey is MAGIC. That is the only explanation. *nods firmly*
The New Year’s resolutions for this year are fairly simple: keep writing, finish grad school, and find a job closer to my family.
I’m pretty happy with 2012. There are a lot of things I could have done differently, but 2012 was the year I fell madly in love with a new show (White Collar YAY!!!) and was promptly buried under a heap of awesome plotbunnies. And made lots of new friends. Seriously, everyone in WC fandom is so nice. *hugs you all*
I want to keep writing fic in 2013, and I want to start writing original stuff, too - I have a scifi novel half-outlined that’s been waiting since around 2008 that I want to work on. (Since I no longer can use “it’s too long and I can’t write plot OMG” as an excuse. :D)
But first I have stocking ficlets that I need to finish!
Dreams of Home
Rating: G
Characters/Pairings: Mozzie, past Neal/Kate
Word count: 300
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers through the end of season 3.
Summary: Kate would have seen the treasure for what it was - a once in a lifetime shot to be seized right away.
First White Collar fic EVER, after marathoning all three seasons. Short little Moz ficlet set post 3.16, posted April 1.
Après la Pluie
Rating: G
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Mozzie, Alex, June
Word Count: 2100
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Summary: M. Moreau is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery inside a silk suit and a smile that will melt all your doubts.
Neal and Moz and a bakery in Paris! Because I always felt like Neal should be in a city, not on an island. Thoroughly Jossed by 4.01, of course, but it was fun to write. Written for a collarcorner prompt, experimenting with a different POV style. Which wasn't intentional, but the first few paragraphs came to me in this outside observer POV and I decided to stick with it and it felt like it worked.
Migration Patterns
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Peter, Mozzie, Elizabeth
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Word Count: 4300
Summary: Hiking through the woods and sleeping under the stars meant you’d really screwed up this time, and you had to get out of town yesterday with your face plastered on wanted posters all over every bus and train station in the area.
Also written during the post-S3 hiatus. Because wanting to stop running is different from knowing how, and I wanted to explore that, a little, and address some of the trust issues I thought Neal would have, coming home again. Which the show, sadly, did not really address, but that's what fic is for.
Chasing Shadows
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Mozzie, Neal, Peter
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Word Count: 3900
Summary: Neal does not handle loss well, and he’s never learned how to let go.
More post-S3 hiatus fic, in which protective!Moz is protective, and Neal tries and fails in various ways to deal with being exiled from New York. Working titles for this one included "the one with Neal and Moz and the seven cats" and "the one where Mozzie gives Peter his version of the 'I'm tired of watching you twist his heart around he's my friend let him go' speech".
Shards
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Diana
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 1300
Summary: A part of him keeps thinking didn’t we just do this?
Neal and Diana at the hospital, waiting for Moz. Because I was halfway through rewatching S2 and could not get the image of Diana brushing broken glass out of Neal's hair out of my head. Short, but I'm still rather pleased with it - apparently I have a thing for writing Neal where he's in shock and completely out of it.
Contingency Planning
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Neal
Spoilers: Through 4.02 Most Wanted
Warnings: Minor blood, bandaging of injuries
Word Count: 2000
Summary: Safety has always been an illusion for the likes of them.
Because I wanted a Neal and June reunion scene! My first June fic - she is so much fun to write, and her relationship with Neal is one of my favorite parts of the show, and I wish she had more screen time.
Keep your memories (but keep your powder dry too)
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Peter, Neal, Mozzie
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 4.01 Wanted
Word Count: 7200
Summary: June has been a lookout and a hand to hold, a shoulder to cry on and a getaway driver; now when nothing else is left she knows how to hold the retreat.
More June! Mostly written during the post-S3 hiatus, and posted shortly after 4.01.
fitted with never a wrinkle
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairing: Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 700
Summary: A good suit means something.
I wanted to write Neal going clothes shopping, and … this happened.
Fragments
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Mozzie, Peter, Sara
Warnings/Spoilers: 4.04 Parting Shots
Word Count: 3900
Summary: He’s in a cab and halfway there before he notices the red light blinking on his ankle.
Post 4.04 Neal angst.
Penelope Weaving
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Neal/Kate, Fowler, Mozzie, Peter, Keller, Adler
Word Count: 78,000
Spoilers: Through 4.03
Warnings: Some violence.
Summary: She’s never liked chess, and this is chess played in the dark and blindfolded, and all the pieces are broken glass. (Kate’s POV of season 1.)
The Giant Epic Kate Novel, aka my WC Big Bang fic for 2012. Which I am quite pleased with. :) (More commentary in previous post.)
The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Kate/Neal
Spoilers/Warnings: through 4.10 Vested Interest
Word Count: 2250
Summary: The sharks have been behind them for months, now.
Kate’s POV of the Monterey Bay incident. Part of what I loved about this episode, and the bits about Neal faking his own death, is how it fits perfectly with Kate and Fowler and the “fake our deaths and live happily ever after” plan - it makes perfect sense that Kate would have reached for that kind of plan as a last resort since she’s seen Neal escape tight situations by faking his own death before. This is early Kate, though, and it was interesting writing this immediately after finishing “Penelope Weaving”, since at the end of that one she’s refined herself down to a single purpose, whereas here she’s still much younger and uncertain and still learning to fit into the kind of life Neal has introduced her to. She’s a very different person here than she is at the end of “Penelope”, or even at the beginning, and that was interesting to explore.
Orpheus, Descending
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Neal/Kate
Spoilers: Through Season 4
Warnings: Angst, vaguely-described sex
Word Count: 1600 words
Summary: Don't look back or you'll lose everything.
2.01 angst. I’ve always wanted to do something with Orpheus (Kate loves the classics!) and not looking back and 1.14, and this was sort of experimental but I think it worked well. I was very pleased with this one.
Unmasked
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Through Season 4
Word Count: 1700 words
Summary: The stranger looks like he could hold his own in a bar fight, but he’s no one Neal wants to trust at his back.
This is eventually going to be the opening of another novel, set pre-series, probably flashing between young Neal&Keller before Mozzie and Neal&Kate&Moz taking down Wilkes. Originally the Wilkes job was going to be a flashback sequence in “Penelope Weaving” but I didn’t have time to include it.
Neal as we know him in canon defines himself by his relationships to the people he loves. He defines his entire concept of morality around loyalty to those people. So who is he when he’s completely alone, as he is when he first runs away? This is Neal before he met Mozzie, and before he met Kate; this is a Neal who doesn’t expect (or want) to have much of a long-term future, and who for a time at least chose to work with Keller. And how he got to that place, and how he made the choice to leave Keller, is a very interesting journey - and as great a moral change (if not a greater one) as the change Peter is trying to lead him towards now. Kate and Mozzie between them, I think, pulled young Neal out of a very dark place, and I want to write more about that.
Fool’s Gold
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 1
Word Count: 1700 words
Summary: Sometimes the real thing is overrated.
This was written for run-the-con which was great fun! June and Neal in S1 getting to know each other! They recognized each other as kindred spirits from the beginning, I think, and I had a lot of fun writing their interactions here.
there is a crack in everything
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Peter
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 2150
Summary: A week ago he thought he'd be dead by now, or else back in prison for good; he hadn't much cared which.
2.10 angst and h/c, because I always wanted a continuation of that scene at Peter’s house - the one where Neal says “this time we do it your way”. I wanted to write what came after that.
I Still Miss Someone
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June/Byron, Neal/Kate
Spoilers: Through 2.01
Warnings: Angst
Word Count: 1700
Summary: They are artists and forgers, both of them, and behind black lines on white paper they can be anyone.
This is not the WC H/C Advent fic I was going to write. (I’m still working on the “Five Christmases Neal spent behind bars (and one he didn’t) fic, which will be posted later.) This is an idea I’d had for a long time, and when I realized “Five Christmases” wasn’t going to be finished in time for my posting date I wrote this instead. And I wrote it pretty quickly, but it’s still one of my favorite fics ever.
I love June. I love June so very much, and I think she and Neal understand each other in ways no one else does, and this fic gave me another opportunity to explore that.
This year I have been writing. A LOT. I posted 16 fics and about 114,800 words in 2012. That’s not counting WIPs - I have more than 10,000 words of the Christmas fic written that hasn’t been posted yet.
Neal Caffrey is MAGIC. That is the only explanation. *nods firmly*
The New Year’s resolutions for this year are fairly simple: keep writing, finish grad school, and find a job closer to my family.
I’m pretty happy with 2012. There are a lot of things I could have done differently, but 2012 was the year I fell madly in love with a new show (White Collar YAY!!!) and was promptly buried under a heap of awesome plotbunnies. And made lots of new friends. Seriously, everyone in WC fandom is so nice. *hugs you all*
I want to keep writing fic in 2013, and I want to start writing original stuff, too - I have a scifi novel half-outlined that’s been waiting since around 2008 that I want to work on. (Since I no longer can use “it’s too long and I can’t write plot OMG” as an excuse. :D)
But first I have stocking ficlets that I need to finish!
Dreams of Home
Rating: G
Characters/Pairings: Mozzie, past Neal/Kate
Word count: 300
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers through the end of season 3.
Summary: Kate would have seen the treasure for what it was - a once in a lifetime shot to be seized right away.
First White Collar fic EVER, after marathoning all three seasons. Short little Moz ficlet set post 3.16, posted April 1.
Après la Pluie
Rating: G
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Mozzie, Alex, June
Word Count: 2100
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Summary: M. Moreau is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery inside a silk suit and a smile that will melt all your doubts.
Neal and Moz and a bakery in Paris! Because I always felt like Neal should be in a city, not on an island. Thoroughly Jossed by 4.01, of course, but it was fun to write. Written for a collarcorner prompt, experimenting with a different POV style. Which wasn't intentional, but the first few paragraphs came to me in this outside observer POV and I decided to stick with it and it felt like it worked.
Migration Patterns
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Peter, Mozzie, Elizabeth
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Word Count: 4300
Summary: Hiking through the woods and sleeping under the stars meant you’d really screwed up this time, and you had to get out of town yesterday with your face plastered on wanted posters all over every bus and train station in the area.
Also written during the post-S3 hiatus. Because wanting to stop running is different from knowing how, and I wanted to explore that, a little, and address some of the trust issues I thought Neal would have, coming home again. Which the show, sadly, did not really address, but that's what fic is for.
Chasing Shadows
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Mozzie, Neal, Peter
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 3.16
Word Count: 3900
Summary: Neal does not handle loss well, and he’s never learned how to let go.
More post-S3 hiatus fic, in which protective!Moz is protective, and Neal tries and fails in various ways to deal with being exiled from New York. Working titles for this one included "the one with Neal and Moz and the seven cats" and "the one where Mozzie gives Peter his version of the 'I'm tired of watching you twist his heart around he's my friend let him go' speech".
Shards
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Diana
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 1300
Summary: A part of him keeps thinking didn’t we just do this?
Neal and Diana at the hospital, waiting for Moz. Because I was halfway through rewatching S2 and could not get the image of Diana brushing broken glass out of Neal's hair out of my head. Short, but I'm still rather pleased with it - apparently I have a thing for writing Neal where he's in shock and completely out of it.
Contingency Planning
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Neal
Spoilers: Through 4.02 Most Wanted
Warnings: Minor blood, bandaging of injuries
Word Count: 2000
Summary: Safety has always been an illusion for the likes of them.
Because I wanted a Neal and June reunion scene! My first June fic - she is so much fun to write, and her relationship with Neal is one of my favorite parts of the show, and I wish she had more screen time.
Keep your memories (but keep your powder dry too)
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Peter, Neal, Mozzie
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 4.01 Wanted
Word Count: 7200
Summary: June has been a lookout and a hand to hold, a shoulder to cry on and a getaway driver; now when nothing else is left she knows how to hold the retreat.
More June! Mostly written during the post-S3 hiatus, and posted shortly after 4.01.
fitted with never a wrinkle
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairing: Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 700
Summary: A good suit means something.
I wanted to write Neal going clothes shopping, and … this happened.
Fragments
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Mozzie, Peter, Sara
Warnings/Spoilers: 4.04 Parting Shots
Word Count: 3900
Summary: He’s in a cab and halfway there before he notices the red light blinking on his ankle.
Post 4.04 Neal angst.
Penelope Weaving
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Neal/Kate, Fowler, Mozzie, Peter, Keller, Adler
Word Count: 78,000
Spoilers: Through 4.03
Warnings: Some violence.
Summary: She’s never liked chess, and this is chess played in the dark and blindfolded, and all the pieces are broken glass. (Kate’s POV of season 1.)
The Giant Epic Kate Novel, aka my WC Big Bang fic for 2012. Which I am quite pleased with. :) (More commentary in previous post.)
The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Kate/Neal
Spoilers/Warnings: through 4.10 Vested Interest
Word Count: 2250
Summary: The sharks have been behind them for months, now.
Kate’s POV of the Monterey Bay incident. Part of what I loved about this episode, and the bits about Neal faking his own death, is how it fits perfectly with Kate and Fowler and the “fake our deaths and live happily ever after” plan - it makes perfect sense that Kate would have reached for that kind of plan as a last resort since she’s seen Neal escape tight situations by faking his own death before. This is early Kate, though, and it was interesting writing this immediately after finishing “Penelope Weaving”, since at the end of that one she’s refined herself down to a single purpose, whereas here she’s still much younger and uncertain and still learning to fit into the kind of life Neal has introduced her to. She’s a very different person here than she is at the end of “Penelope”, or even at the beginning, and that was interesting to explore.
Orpheus, Descending
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Neal/Kate
Spoilers: Through Season 4
Warnings: Angst, vaguely-described sex
Word Count: 1600 words
Summary: Don't look back or you'll lose everything.
2.01 angst. I’ve always wanted to do something with Orpheus (Kate loves the classics!) and not looking back and 1.14, and this was sort of experimental but I think it worked well. I was very pleased with this one.
Unmasked
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Through Season 4
Word Count: 1700 words
Summary: The stranger looks like he could hold his own in a bar fight, but he’s no one Neal wants to trust at his back.
This is eventually going to be the opening of another novel, set pre-series, probably flashing between young Neal&Keller before Mozzie and Neal&Kate&Moz taking down Wilkes. Originally the Wilkes job was going to be a flashback sequence in “Penelope Weaving” but I didn’t have time to include it.
Neal as we know him in canon defines himself by his relationships to the people he loves. He defines his entire concept of morality around loyalty to those people. So who is he when he’s completely alone, as he is when he first runs away? This is Neal before he met Mozzie, and before he met Kate; this is a Neal who doesn’t expect (or want) to have much of a long-term future, and who for a time at least chose to work with Keller. And how he got to that place, and how he made the choice to leave Keller, is a very interesting journey - and as great a moral change (if not a greater one) as the change Peter is trying to lead him towards now. Kate and Mozzie between them, I think, pulled young Neal out of a very dark place, and I want to write more about that.
Fool’s Gold
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June, Neal
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 1
Word Count: 1700 words
Summary: Sometimes the real thing is overrated.
This was written for run-the-con which was great fun! June and Neal in S1 getting to know each other! They recognized each other as kindred spirits from the beginning, I think, and I had a lot of fun writing their interactions here.
there is a crack in everything
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Neal, Peter
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 2
Word Count: 2150
Summary: A week ago he thought he'd be dead by now, or else back in prison for good; he hadn't much cared which.
2.10 angst and h/c, because I always wanted a continuation of that scene at Peter’s house - the one where Neal says “this time we do it your way”. I wanted to write what came after that.
I Still Miss Someone
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: June/Byron, Neal/Kate
Spoilers: Through 2.01
Warnings: Angst
Word Count: 1700
Summary: They are artists and forgers, both of them, and behind black lines on white paper they can be anyone.
This is not the WC H/C Advent fic I was going to write. (I’m still working on the “Five Christmases Neal spent behind bars (and one he didn’t) fic, which will be posted later.) This is an idea I’d had for a long time, and when I realized “Five Christmases” wasn’t going to be finished in time for my posting date I wrote this instead. And I wrote it pretty quickly, but it’s still one of my favorite fics ever.
I love June. I love June so very much, and I think she and Neal understand each other in ways no one else does, and this fic gave me another opportunity to explore that.