guilty pleasures
The thing about writing self-indulgent fic is that self-indulgence tends to snowball. I have such a weakness for h/c, and I know this about myself so I do try to give myself firm limits for what I'm allowed to include in a single story. But with sci-fi exploring there's such endless potential, and there's so many characters that it kind of feels like it makes sense to spread the hurt around, you know? But the danger is that this story is just going to turn into a series of danger-worry-comfort type adventures. Like, someone gets eaten by a lizard and then there is h/c. And then someone gets attacked by a carnivorous plant, and then there is h/c. And then someone falls off a cliff and then there is h/c. And then everyone gets hypothermia.
Bringing characters who won't admit their love together through h/c is perhaps my all time favorite guilty pleasure, but I have to keep reminding myself that there are other possible plotlines and not all the plots should fit into the same mold. Must curtail the h/c! Writing guilty-pleasure fic should not be this hard.
Speaking of, have some cave adventures:
The detector beeps, sharp and sudden, echoing through the cavern. William jumps, and Gabe steps forward eagerly, holding it out. The beeping gets louder.
“Over here,” says Gabe, and William curves the arc of the flashlight, over grey stone floor, grey stone floor, then dark gaping hole. Gabe holds the detector over the narrow opening, and the beeping goes wild. “Lovely,” he says. “Good thing we brought the rope.”
There is no way William is getting into that hole. No way on earth, no way in hell, no way in the whole fucking galaxy is he sticking so much as a toe into that yawning darkness. “This one’s all yours,” he says, and backs away.
Gabe leans down, assessing the hole. He’s all lean muscle, narrow and flexible, but it only takes William a glance to see that there’s no way his shoulders are fitting through that opening. Gabe must realize the same thing, because he curses and turns away, his face dark. “We’ll go back,” he says dourly. “Get Mikey or Ross or Urie or one of the Alexes.”
William’s not going to volunteer, he’s not, he’s not, but, “It’ll take us three hours to get back,” he says. “It’ll be too late. Anyway, we don’t need them.”
“William…” starts Gabe, even though he has to know how this is going to end, but William’s not done.
“I’ll have you know that I am slender. Willowy. Supple. Or so I’ve been told. Also, Mikey? Ross? Those are your alternative?” He thinks he’s a little bit offended.
“We have no idea what’s down there,” reminds Gabe.
“Exactly. And you were going to send Ross?”
Which is how he ends up with a rope on his waist, squeezing his way through the narrow aperture. It’s a tight fit even for his narrow frame, and he feels a chunk of his flesh tear as he wriggles his way down. Wriggling, it turns out, is neither sexy nor dignified, and he frowns at Gabe’s amused face. “I’m a paleobotanist,” he says bitterly, as Gabe starts lowering him down. “This was not in the job description.”
“Yeah, but your memoir is totally going to outsell all the other paleobotanists’,” says Gabe cheerfully.
That is, actually, a consoling thought - until the rope jerks down suddenly and William slides and scrapes down a few feet of the rough, slimy rock. “Only if I live to write it,” he yells when he gets his breath back. “If you drop me I will haunt your ass.”
“What’s that supposed to be, incentive?” Gabe shouts back.
William allows himself a snort and a smile, but only because he’s now ten feet down into the dark well and Gabe can’t possibly see him.
The time I spent looking through picspams to try and get a good comparison of William and Gabe's shoulder sizes was completely justified, so there. The things I put myself through in the name of research. (I couldn't actually find any conclusive pictures. Gabe is actually really skinny when you look at it, and there are totally pictures when they look like they're close to the same size. But it goes against my personal canon to have them be the same size. William has to be smaller, he has to be.)
So it's a long weekend and I have a terrible case of senioritis and a lizardfic open on my desktop that has more characters than plot. Which is to say, I'm in a commentfic sort of mood, so if you give me characters (pretty much anyone in bandom, I think, minus The Used because I don't know anything about them) and/or a prompt or even just a nudge of some sort, I will write you a bit of their adventures on Planet Lizard.
(Sorry for all the lizard spamming lately. Yes it is possible that I'm just going to keep on writing disconnected bits of this story forever.)
Bringing characters who won't admit their love together through h/c is perhaps my all time favorite guilty pleasure, but I have to keep reminding myself that there are other possible plotlines and not all the plots should fit into the same mold. Must curtail the h/c! Writing guilty-pleasure fic should not be this hard.
Speaking of, have some cave adventures:
The detector beeps, sharp and sudden, echoing through the cavern. William jumps, and Gabe steps forward eagerly, holding it out. The beeping gets louder.
“Over here,” says Gabe, and William curves the arc of the flashlight, over grey stone floor, grey stone floor, then dark gaping hole. Gabe holds the detector over the narrow opening, and the beeping goes wild. “Lovely,” he says. “Good thing we brought the rope.”
There is no way William is getting into that hole. No way on earth, no way in hell, no way in the whole fucking galaxy is he sticking so much as a toe into that yawning darkness. “This one’s all yours,” he says, and backs away.
Gabe leans down, assessing the hole. He’s all lean muscle, narrow and flexible, but it only takes William a glance to see that there’s no way his shoulders are fitting through that opening. Gabe must realize the same thing, because he curses and turns away, his face dark. “We’ll go back,” he says dourly. “Get Mikey or Ross or Urie or one of the Alexes.”
William’s not going to volunteer, he’s not, he’s not, but, “It’ll take us three hours to get back,” he says. “It’ll be too late. Anyway, we don’t need them.”
“William…” starts Gabe, even though he has to know how this is going to end, but William’s not done.
“I’ll have you know that I am slender. Willowy. Supple. Or so I’ve been told. Also, Mikey? Ross? Those are your alternative?” He thinks he’s a little bit offended.
“We have no idea what’s down there,” reminds Gabe.
“Exactly. And you were going to send Ross?”
Which is how he ends up with a rope on his waist, squeezing his way through the narrow aperture. It’s a tight fit even for his narrow frame, and he feels a chunk of his flesh tear as he wriggles his way down. Wriggling, it turns out, is neither sexy nor dignified, and he frowns at Gabe’s amused face. “I’m a paleobotanist,” he says bitterly, as Gabe starts lowering him down. “This was not in the job description.”
“Yeah, but your memoir is totally going to outsell all the other paleobotanists’,” says Gabe cheerfully.
That is, actually, a consoling thought - until the rope jerks down suddenly and William slides and scrapes down a few feet of the rough, slimy rock. “Only if I live to write it,” he yells when he gets his breath back. “If you drop me I will haunt your ass.”
“What’s that supposed to be, incentive?” Gabe shouts back.
William allows himself a snort and a smile, but only because he’s now ten feet down into the dark well and Gabe can’t possibly see him.
The time I spent looking through picspams to try and get a good comparison of William and Gabe's shoulder sizes was completely justified, so there. The things I put myself through in the name of research. (I couldn't actually find any conclusive pictures. Gabe is actually really skinny when you look at it, and there are totally pictures when they look like they're close to the same size. But it goes against my personal canon to have them be the same size. William has to be smaller, he has to be.)
So it's a long weekend and I have a terrible case of senioritis and a lizardfic open on my desktop that has more characters than plot. Which is to say, I'm in a commentfic sort of mood, so if you give me characters (pretty much anyone in bandom, I think, minus The Used because I don't know anything about them) and/or a prompt or even just a nudge of some sort, I will write you a bit of their adventures on Planet Lizard.
(Sorry for all the lizard spamming lately. Yes it is possible that I'm just going to keep on writing disconnected bits of this story forever.)