Lurker Central

This year was an embarrassment of riches - I got two fics in the main collection (I went out on the pinch hit list, but I know I had a gift fic uploaded that earlier that day before I hit the list, so I'm wondering if those two were my original writer and my pinch hitter) and a treat in the Madness collection. All three were Into The Woods fics, which surprised me - I knew getting a Warriors Of Virtue fic was kind of a pipe dream, since that's very much a No One But Me fandom, but if I were going to pick one of my requested fandoms to win I would have put money on Tombstone. But it was an awesome surprise, because while I've read Tombstone fic I there's so little Into The Woods to be found.

And now there's three more!

the rope you began with (was never that straight): For all of her happiness, part of Cinderella is afraid of being stuck in a small story with the same few people for the rest of her life.

Absolutely fantastic Cinderella voice and it really feels like the original/DVD cast, my preferred one (especially Red!) The fairy tale cameos are to die for.

Beyond Ever After: It may not have been the happily ever they once imagined, but that didn't mean they couldn't try.

A very sweet, aching coda, this time from the Baker's POV.

Ever After: All is mended, and it's not just for today.

Just the summary made me smile. A quick snapshot of the Baker, Cinderella, Red and Jack pulling together after everything. I adored the description of their cottage.

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Now assorted recs! I feel like I haven't even started digging through the archive (there are ten Brave fics, guys! TEN! And a 38K B5 fic!) so here's just a handful that completely knocked me over with awesome.

Bridges Unburnt: Faiza sets out on her own. (Captain Britain & MI:13)

♥FAIZA!♥ An absolutely perfect character study of Faiza and her awesome.

It's a love story for the new age: This is how the story goes:
“Marry me,” he says.
“Are you serious?” she replies. (Gargoyles)

♥FOX!♥ ♥FOX/XANATOS♥ (and the best part, hints of Fox/Xanatos/Owen!) This Fox is every bit as sharp-edged and messy and wild as she is in canon and her relationship with Xanatos hits every right note. It's like they all walked right off the show and into my computer.

Prisoner's Dilemma: AU: Set in a world where Miaka and Yui never appeared to fulfill their destinies as priestesses, Kutou and Kounan are locked in a seemingly endless war. Peace has begun to seem like an impossibility when the Emperor of Kounan is faced with a difficult choice that could spare his people. (Fushigi Yuugi)

Guys, I don't care if you've even ever heard of Fushigi Yuugi, read this anyway. An absolutely gorgeous AU (one that in a lot of ways has the potential to be a lot kinder and more hopeful to Nakago and Hotohori than canon ever could be.) I wish there could be books and books of this verse to see what happens next.

A Daring Escape: Carrier pigeons are very useful when planning an escape from a madman’s lair of doom. (Jonathon Coulton's "Skullcrusher Mountain")

Smartly drawn OCs and hilariously on point details. (the mentioning of a "rescuing-a-kidnapped-person discount" was my favorite.)

Go! Read!

Oh dear God, I just spent All The Money and I still have to buy for my mother because she's continuing the annual tradition of refusing to ask for anything I can just buy on Amazon. (My sister and I will not buy anything for her without first asking in explicit, gory detail exactly what it is she wants, she's that notorious for returning gifts. One year she actually made me return her Christmas present, marching me right back to the counter at Macy's. Because it, and I quote, "cost too much." No, we will never let her forget it.) But at least that yearly horror's mostly done.

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Speaking of horror! For everyone who's having problems with whatever-this-is LJ's doing, advancing's put up a workaround post here. LJ has a pattern of making ridiculous, sweeping changes that gradually get fixed over the next month or so, so let's hope this is more of that.

(Hilariously, my LJ is apparently so old timey that it's still exactly the same, subject lines and all. If it wasn't for all the outrage on my flist I never would have realized anything had been changed!)

ETA: Gotta admit, I kinda like that little thing that marks new comments. There's a big long thread on fanficrants where that's coming in handy.

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Wonderful stranger, I don't know who you are, but thank you so much for this story. Everyone should read how wonderful it is. (it's 2014!Cas/2009!Dean and utterly perfect.)

I loved THOR!

I loved loved loved Loki in that movie.

And I love Foster the People's "Pumped Up Kicks."

So I've like pinkfinity a vid FOR ME.

All the Other Kids

Watch and be happy too!

(As a side note, in my head Tom Hiddleston in that movie is what Jesse Turner grows up to look like.)

PEOPLE.

Have you ever read a fic so good, so epic and emotional that it sinks into your bones and almost makes you despair a little, because you know in your heart you will never write something half so awesome? But it's still an almost, because the time spent despairing would be better used on reading the fic again?

Hell or High Water is one of those fics.

Written for the Everlasting Birthday Challenge for the prompt "Dean and Sam die but they’re nowhere to be found in Heaven/Earth/Hell. Cue BAMF Cas on quest to find them," this is epic and beautiful and brutal and heartbreaking. I seriously contemplated getting docked at work for coming back from lunch late so I could finish it (and ducked out at the first opportunity, because I felt like if I didn't know how it ended I might die.)

(Why did I start reading a 25K fic on my lunch break? Because I am a FOOL, that's why.)

Go. Read. Shower with praise.

(reads the fight scene again. Oh, Cas.)

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Why did I even glance at comment_fic today?! I cannot resist the siren call of the crossover! (Oh, right. Because I am a fooooooooooool.)

I had off today and had planned to DO THINGS.

None of the things involved lounging around in my pajamas all day, which is pretty much all I manged to accomplish. I only even bothered to get dressed because people were coming over for game and I didn't want to DM in said pajamas. One must have standards, after all.

A big contributing factor to my day of laze was working through this frakking gorgeous fic:

Contapasso: In an AU season 6, Castiel calls Dean and a mysteriously returned Sam to help investigate AWOL angels and strange goings on in a little Wisconsin town --- the strangest being that the town doesn't actually exist.

This is the kind of fic that actually makes you despair a little that you will never ever be able to write something so good. It's epic and lyrical every word feels true. There's killer h/c and fabulously developed Dean/Cas that doesn't push Sam aside. And seriously, one of the best first time scenes I've ever read.

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Posted fic last night: Celebrations, a fluffy bit of hurt/comfort for Dean's birthday. It'll be the last fluff for a while; I'll be bouncing between my future fic (AKA Fic Only I Will Want To Read) and my dark_fest fic, neither of which are especially fluffy. (What's the opposite of fluffy? Spikey? The dark_fest one is especially spikey.)

Sorry, Cas. It's hard being my favorite character.

Have you ever read a crossover so right and so obvious that you wanted to hit yourself for not thinking of it? Check this out: Like Father by niennahfic. A very short (less than 300 words) gem of a The Dark Knight/Watchmen ficlet built around a brilliant idea: that the Joker's father just might have been a Comedian.

I've never had a more Well, obviously moment in my life.

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Part of the fun of writing journal entries for Rorschach is his ability to write completely crazy things with a straight face. (My favorite line of Reflection was having him describe Wonder Woman as "dressed like a whore on Flag Day.") In the fic I'm working on now he just wrote about how his morals are impeding his investigation and I had to break off writing because I started giggling (it'll make sense in context.:)

Of course, the other side of things is the constant questions: Am I using too many semi-colons? Should I be dropping this pronoun? How run-on should this sentance be? Why can't he write the way he speaks?!?! Find the balance is so nerve-wracking.

That said, I have my fingers crossed that I'll have this fic ready for beta by the end of the week. *crosses fingers harder*

This fic is brilliant: Marking Days, by etherati.

And it's so very simple: Rorschach thinks Dan is dead and slowly unravels. That's the plot, but it doesn't properly capture this story or its gorgeous language. This fic is painful in the best possible way.

The author has doubts about whether or not it's too much, but she's being modest. Every word of this rings true.

Go! Go read!

There is a lot of good fic coming out of the lgbtfest. A sampling!

1) All Day Permanent Red by equus_vodka is one of those stories that's so gorgeous it almost makes you despair because you know you'll never write anything so good. Logan in WWII, just pitch perfect voice, and one of the most believable OCs I've read in a long time.

2) What You Will by baffledking is a Twelfth Night story about Orsino and Viola/Cesario and how the dividing line between those two identities blurs. Beautiful language.

3) We Will Question All Your Answers" by allaroughdraft. Firefly story where River dressing like a boy for a job makes her realize that's how it should have been all along. I love River's voice and the shifting pronouns in this.

4) Lacuna by biichan. Doctor Who, Jamie/Two fic that uses the Time Lords wiping Jamie's memory to devastating effect. I know this is relevant to the interests of at least one person on my flist.:)

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I already posted on beta_search, but I'd love to keep this in house if possible.:) I'm looking for a beta for a Watchmen/DCU crossover set Some Time between the end of Final Crisis and the Race for the Cowl nonsense going on now. raggyanne, my usual beta extraordinaire, doesn't know Watchmen and I need someone who can tell me when my Rorschach voice is slipping. The story is around 4800 words and features Rorschach and Nightwing (and is more than a little related to this dream I had).

I'm sure most of the interet has heard of this incident where the Neanderthal film critic for the NY Post wapped Roger Ebert with a binder for the mortal sin of tapping him one the shoulder. Well, Ebert posted about the incident on his blog, and is much more awesome than you or I could ever be. I've never read a more graceful, classy smackdown, although I especially enjoyed Ebert's wife offering to "get a no-neck guy from the West Side to break his knees." That's true love, right there.

Doctor Who vid rec! All in All (song by Lifehouse) is the best Ten video I've seen yet. The vid captures him particularly well; it's bittersweet and lonely and has that nervous energy Ten always has below the surface, but it also has that fierce hope that I like so much about him. It's by humansrsuperior, who also did Broken, my favorite S3 DW vid. Good stuff.

Chibi and I were having a conversation earlier about Lexx, and I commented that Star Wars is what every DM wants their space campaign to be, but Lexx is what it almost always turns into.

Her response was, "Man, I wish my (Spelljammer) campaign was more like Lexx. Then I'd be able to predict what my players are doing." You really have to have seen the show to appreciate just how cracked out her players must be if they make Lexx predictable.

Also, I have some fic recs! First, The Body Found, by fourteencandles (House, House/Wilson, 46K words). This is a long, fantastic fic, plotty and painful and real. Wilson goes missing, and the fallout touches everyone at Princeton Plainsboro. The characterization is just pitch perfect, especially for House; the way he reacts is both emotionally wrenching and so true to the guy we see on the show that every word is believable. Hurt/Comfort at it's finest, and so much more besides.

And changing gears, some unrepentant smut! Training Exercise by futuresoon (Heroes, Peter/Claude, 3583 words). There are few things I like more than Claude molesting Peter in public in the name of superpower training, and this is one of the best I've found. Claude is in full snark, poor Peter's rambling, panicky POV is hilarious, and the sex is hot without being in the least explicit.

Read! Enjoy!