yuletide reveals!
All of my author guesses save one were wrong. Oh, well! I don't think anybody tried to guess my works, but I wrote five stories for Yuletide: my assignment, a pinch hit, and three treats.
Correspondence (1512 words) by Isis
Fandom: To Whatever - Shaenon Garrity, The Thing in the Walls Wants Your Small Change - Virginia M. Mohlere
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Ethan (To Whatever), Whatever Lives in the Walls (To Whatever)
Additional Tags: Epistolary, Footnotes, Tiny bit of crossover, Worldbuilding
Summary: Translator’s note: After discovering that I'd saved my correspondence from the early days of our acquaintance, the author of these notes asked for equal time. As you might expect for a translation from a pandimensional runic language that is not actually written as much as it is instantiated, this is only an approximation. (Or: 'Whatever' writes letters, too.)
For the third year in a row, I wrote a crossover for my assignment, though this was more a cameo appearance by a second fandom rather than a full-blown crossover.
Chelonie asked for both "To Whatever" and "The Thing in the Walls Wants Your Small Change", and for the first fandom, specifically requested "where it gets the new half and half", and I was, "oh, of course, it gets the money from the tiny dragon who also lives in the walls!" She also had requested the creature's POV, and listed epistolary as a like, and so I decided to mirror the original, but in the story the creature communicates through weird runes, so that led to the whole faux-translation with footnotes thing which kind of got away from me, but it was fun. :-)
Second Hand Rose (2144 words) by Isis
Fandom: Trashy Vampire Romance Novel - Fractal
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Pascal/Ricardo
Characters: Pascal (Trashy Vampire Romance Novel), Ricardo Castro (Trashy Vampire Romance Novel)
Additional Tags: Road Trips, Cell Phones, Crossdressing, unintended consequences of technology, Pascal still hasn't figured out cell phones, Kel and Lamb make cameos
Summary: While Ricardo drives them toward Las Vegas, Pascal looks through the clothing he bought at the thrift store.
This was a post-deadline pinch hit for
Icie, which lingered long enough that I decided to google their intriguing-sounding fandoms. As it turns out, Trashy Vampire Romance Novel is a tgchan "quest", a type of media that was completely new to me: it's an interactive story where the author (Fractal, in this case) posts a few illustrated scenes of a story, and commenters suggest what the characters should do and what choices they should make - sort of a WIP CYOA. TVRN, a sexy and funny story which is exactly what its title implies, only started a few months ago, so it didn't take long for me to read up to "now" in it, and it was a lot of fun doing so. I wrote a possible next scene, which has just been jossed, but oh, well!
Scoundrels and Dragons (4918 words) by Isis
Fandom: Strange the Dreamer Series - Laini Taylor
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Thyon Nero/Ruza
Characters: Thyon Nero, Ruza
Additional Tags: Dragons, Post-Canon, Language, First Time, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, Yuletide Treat
Summary: It was on Myali that Ruza found the dragons. Well, they weren’t actually dragons; their wings were small and stubby, and their necks seemed oddly skinny. Really, they were only glittering oversized long-necked winged lizards - but Thyon certainly wasn’t going to say that to Ruza.
This was a treat for
Fairleigh. It's my longest Yuletide fic this year, but it was a struggle to keep it relatively short because I kept going off on worldbuilding tangents, which I eventually had to scrap so I could finish! I adore this pairing - while reading the first book I kinda wanted Thyon/Lazlo early on, but then I couldn't bring myself to break up the very clearly MFEO canon het, and then the second book lays the groundwork for Thyon/Ruza and that's the kind of thing I can't resist, the hints of a m/m (or f/f) pairing. It's a great book series and I recommend it, and someone not me nominated this pairing for Chocolate Box, too!
My England, My Love (1439 words) by Isis
Fandom: The Last Kingdom (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Characters: Alfred the Great (849-899), Uhtred of Bebbanburg
Additional Tags: Canonical Character Death, Supernatural Elements, Prophetic Visions, Future Fic, Historical References, Yuletide Treat
Summary: On his deathbed, King Alfred is granted a vision of the future.
Historical events aren't spoilers, are they? I admit I felt a little guilty about giving
dottore_polidori character death as a treat, but their request for "happy things for Alfred" and their likes of religious and mortality-related themes put this into my head as soon as I finished watching S3.
The White Lady (2410 words) by Isis
Fandom: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Roach (The Witcher)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Noir, Human Roach, Detectives, Yuletide Treat, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, based on an actual game quest, but only vaguely spoilery
Summary: I roll down the window of Geralt’s crappy beater. “Can I help you?” // She looks startled at first, then smiles. Probably surprised to see a friendly face in this part of town. “I’m looking for a Mister Geralt of Rivia,” she says tentatively. “He’s a detective?” // “He’s my boss,” I say. “In there. Long white hair, lots of scars, can’t miss him. Don’t mind the whores.”
This is my personal favorite of my Yuletide stories this year, and it was super fun to write! The Witcher is probably my current main fandom, so when I went searching for treats to write, I immediately checked out the requests. I had been amused to see Roach in the tagset, who is Geralt's horse (the name refers to the European fish, not the insect) and so of course I looked to see if anyone had actually requested Roach as a character, and saw
hakuen's request, which included: But the whole "get hired to investigate this death/situation" thing and the comments he makes while you're looking for clues has me thinking every time about how awesome a noir detective/PI AU would be. So if you're up for it, Maltese Falcon-ing it up would be AWESOME.
I could not resist this challenge! It was instantly obvious to me that Roach would be Geralt's driver (who I pictured as Susie Myerson from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), and I immediately started writing the story from her point of view. Then it occurred to me that the noir POV is usually the cynical detective, so I rewrote the first few paragraphs from Geralt's POV. But that went nowhere, so I went back to my first attempt, which flowed so beautifully I knew that this was the way it had to be. I wanted to base it on a wraith-related quest (because dangerous dames), and I wanted to reference the important canonical things about Roach: that Geralt always names his current horse Roach (and she's always a mare), and that in Witcher 3, Geralt (the player character) can always call Roach to his side, no matter where she was last or where Geralt is. I started out with that, and then the gun I metaphorically hung on the wall at the beginning presented itself to me to be obligingly shot at the end!
Crossposted from isis at Dreamwidth where there are
comments. | Comment at Dreamwidth
Correspondence (1512 words) by Isis
Fandom: To Whatever - Shaenon Garrity, The Thing in the Walls Wants Your Small Change - Virginia M. Mohlere
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Ethan (To Whatever), Whatever Lives in the Walls (To Whatever)
Additional Tags: Epistolary, Footnotes, Tiny bit of crossover, Worldbuilding
Summary: Translator’s note: After discovering that I'd saved my correspondence from the early days of our acquaintance, the author of these notes asked for equal time. As you might expect for a translation from a pandimensional runic language that is not actually written as much as it is instantiated, this is only an approximation. (Or: 'Whatever' writes letters, too.)
For the third year in a row, I wrote a crossover for my assignment, though this was more a cameo appearance by a second fandom rather than a full-blown crossover.
Chelonie asked for both "To Whatever" and "The Thing in the Walls Wants Your Small Change", and for the first fandom, specifically requested "where it gets the new half and half", and I was, "oh, of course, it gets the money from the tiny dragon who also lives in the walls!" She also had requested the creature's POV, and listed epistolary as a like, and so I decided to mirror the original, but in the story the creature communicates through weird runes, so that led to the whole faux-translation with footnotes thing which kind of got away from me, but it was fun. :-)
Second Hand Rose (2144 words) by Isis
Fandom: Trashy Vampire Romance Novel - Fractal
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Pascal/Ricardo
Characters: Pascal (Trashy Vampire Romance Novel), Ricardo Castro (Trashy Vampire Romance Novel)
Additional Tags: Road Trips, Cell Phones, Crossdressing, unintended consequences of technology, Pascal still hasn't figured out cell phones, Kel and Lamb make cameos
Summary: While Ricardo drives them toward Las Vegas, Pascal looks through the clothing he bought at the thrift store.
This was a post-deadline pinch hit for
Icie, which lingered long enough that I decided to google their intriguing-sounding fandoms. As it turns out, Trashy Vampire Romance Novel is a tgchan "quest", a type of media that was completely new to me: it's an interactive story where the author (Fractal, in this case) posts a few illustrated scenes of a story, and commenters suggest what the characters should do and what choices they should make - sort of a WIP CYOA. TVRN, a sexy and funny story which is exactly what its title implies, only started a few months ago, so it didn't take long for me to read up to "now" in it, and it was a lot of fun doing so. I wrote a possible next scene, which has just been jossed, but oh, well!
Scoundrels and Dragons (4918 words) by Isis
Fandom: Strange the Dreamer Series - Laini Taylor
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Thyon Nero/Ruza
Characters: Thyon Nero, Ruza
Additional Tags: Dragons, Post-Canon, Language, First Time, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, Yuletide Treat
Summary: It was on Myali that Ruza found the dragons. Well, they weren’t actually dragons; their wings were small and stubby, and their necks seemed oddly skinny. Really, they were only glittering oversized long-necked winged lizards - but Thyon certainly wasn’t going to say that to Ruza.
This was a treat for
Fairleigh. It's my longest Yuletide fic this year, but it was a struggle to keep it relatively short because I kept going off on worldbuilding tangents, which I eventually had to scrap so I could finish! I adore this pairing - while reading the first book I kinda wanted Thyon/Lazlo early on, but then I couldn't bring myself to break up the very clearly MFEO canon het, and then the second book lays the groundwork for Thyon/Ruza and that's the kind of thing I can't resist, the hints of a m/m (or f/f) pairing. It's a great book series and I recommend it, and someone not me nominated this pairing for Chocolate Box, too!
My England, My Love (1439 words) by Isis
Fandom: The Last Kingdom (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Characters: Alfred the Great (849-899), Uhtred of Bebbanburg
Additional Tags: Canonical Character Death, Supernatural Elements, Prophetic Visions, Future Fic, Historical References, Yuletide Treat
Summary: On his deathbed, King Alfred is granted a vision of the future.
Historical events aren't spoilers, are they? I admit I felt a little guilty about giving
dottore_polidori character death as a treat, but their request for "happy things for Alfred" and their likes of religious and mortality-related themes put this into my head as soon as I finished watching S3.
The White Lady (2410 words) by Isis
Fandom: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Roach (The Witcher)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Noir, Human Roach, Detectives, Yuletide Treat, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, based on an actual game quest, but only vaguely spoilery
Summary: I roll down the window of Geralt’s crappy beater. “Can I help you?” // She looks startled at first, then smiles. Probably surprised to see a friendly face in this part of town. “I’m looking for a Mister Geralt of Rivia,” she says tentatively. “He’s a detective?” // “He’s my boss,” I say. “In there. Long white hair, lots of scars, can’t miss him. Don’t mind the whores.”
This is my personal favorite of my Yuletide stories this year, and it was super fun to write! The Witcher is probably my current main fandom, so when I went searching for treats to write, I immediately checked out the requests. I had been amused to see Roach in the tagset, who is Geralt's horse (the name refers to the European fish, not the insect) and so of course I looked to see if anyone had actually requested Roach as a character, and saw
hakuen's request, which included: But the whole "get hired to investigate this death/situation" thing and the comments he makes while you're looking for clues has me thinking every time about how awesome a noir detective/PI AU would be. So if you're up for it, Maltese Falcon-ing it up would be AWESOME.
I could not resist this challenge! It was instantly obvious to me that Roach would be Geralt's driver (who I pictured as Susie Myerson from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), and I immediately started writing the story from her point of view. Then it occurred to me that the noir POV is usually the cynical detective, so I rewrote the first few paragraphs from Geralt's POV. But that went nowhere, so I went back to my first attempt, which flowed so beautifully I knew that this was the way it had to be. I wanted to base it on a wraith-related quest (because dangerous dames), and I wanted to reference the important canonical things about Roach: that Geralt always names his current horse Roach (and she's always a mare), and that in Witcher 3, Geralt (the player character) can always call Roach to his side, no matter where she was last or where Geralt is. I started out with that, and then the gun I metaphorically hung on the wall at the beginning presented itself to me to be obligingly shot at the end!
Crossposted from isis at Dreamwidth where there are
comments. | Comment at Dreamwidth