Comments | karaokegal: "Being Alive" Torchwood drabble Jack/Gwen, Gwen/Esther Rating-PG13

karaokegal

"Being Alive" Torchwood drabble Jack/Gwen, Gwen/Esther Rating-PG13

Nov 23, 2011 21:04

Title: Being Alive
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairings: Jack/Gwen, Gwen/Esther
Rating: PG13
Wordcount: 100
Notes: Drabble-a-Day 2011. Day 327. Prompt from larebilinyc: Gwen/Esther - Survivor's Guilt (during/after 4.10). Unbeta'd. Comments and concrit welcome.
Summary: Jack deals with death in his own way. Gwen has something else in mind.

( Someone to hurt you too deep. )

esther drummond, jack/gwen, fanfic, drabble, gwen cooper, torchwood, drabble-a-day 2011, jack harkness, real!jack

Comments 11

book_junkie007 November 24 2011, 06:57:29 UTC

I like this. It seems very much a Torchwood thing to do, seeking solace in other people's arms. I only wonder what Ianto thought when Tosh and Owen died if Jack and Gwen had slept together.

Yay for Gwen growing and realising that having extramarital sex with Jack isn't the healthiest thing to do when dealing with grief. She should have learnt this lesson when she had the affair with Owen.

I don't think you need the comma in the third last sentence: it messes with the flow and disrupts the meaning. Try ... had touched the part of Gwen she thought she'd lost ...

karaokegal November 24 2011, 07:03:18 UTC

Bad comma, bad! Fixed and thanks for the catch. I'm intending to imply that Jack and Gwen most certainly slept together after Owen and Tosh died. (My fanon is that Jack would have preferred a Jack/Gwen/Ianto threesome, but Ianto wouldn't go for it.)

I'm glad you like the basic premise. It wasn't necessarily where I thought I'd end up, but the prompt sort of sent me in the direction

Thanks for reading and commenting.

book_junkie007 November 24 2011, 07:09:52 UTC

Welcome. Awesome sauce. Silly Ianto, not wanting to share Jack. Jack will still go after what he wants (i.e., Gwen).

I have fixed the Torchwood fic, by having added some scenes to it, and I think my Firefly fic is ready to go (I don't think there was as much canon capping in the Firefly one as there was in the Torchwood one). Would you mind looking at the Torchwood one again and take a first pass at the Firefly one?

karaokegal November 24 2011, 07:11:14 UTC

Send everything to my email.

cookielaura November 28 2011, 20:28:14 UTC

Thanks for this, I BADLY needed some Jack/Gwen today even if it's only a past-tense one!! Beautifully written as usual x

karaokegal November 30 2011, 04:48:17 UTC

Thanks, sweetie! I didn't mean for this to be so melancholy, but that's really where the prompt led me.

larebilinyc November 28 2011, 21:17:14 UTC

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh

Brilliant, the last three lines in particular carry a real punch. I love how you capture her growth in maturity and need to take responsibility for the consequences of her lifestyle in the right way.

Thank you!

karaokegal November 30 2011, 04:47:42 UTC

I'm surprised it ended up where it did, but I can't spare Jack/Gwen the angst when it fits the story. Thanks for the prompt. I enjoyed working with it.

xenoamorist November 28 2011, 21:51:43 UTC

Echoing everyone else on Gwen's character development; I like that. :)

As far as concrit goes, I would suggest going through and really showing all her emotions and showing all the little details about Jack's hurt, rather than just telling the reader straight up-telling will get the message across, but it's not as evocative as showing. I can go into more detail if you'd like.

karaokegal November 30 2011, 04:46:58 UTC

It's definitely a problem inherent in the drabble form, but I'm always interested in trying to overcome it. Any pointers would be appreciated.

xenoamorist November 30 2011, 05:41:18 UTC

Ideally, you don't want to explain things outright to the reader-you want to leave them with tiny pictures that they can put together to infer from. Instead of saying "Jack was embarrassed", you'd say "Jack blushed", and the reader will fill in the rest. Just as an example, here's my take on Jack seeking out Gwen after loss of a Torchwood member:

He's rough with her, just like the first time in his office after Owen and Tosh-he slams her up against a wall, pins her hands down with his, nips at her neck and makes her gasp-and yet, when they lie together in the afterglow, he sighs and holds her close, his voice soft: "At least you're still here."

"I'm sorry about Esther," she whispers. His only response is to pull her in closer, but she squeezes her eyes shut and thinks of Rhys.
This version is 85 words long with minimal telling ("He's rough with her" is the only line that really tells anything). It's definitely different than what you were going for; in your drabble, I presume Gwen turned down Jack because she realized he wanted ( ... )