Words in the Heroes' Tongue

Happy birthday to trinfaneb

I had hoped to have a birthday fic done, a sequel to my BtVS/Ringworld crossover The Ringworld Slayer, but, because I’ve been working on ‘Tabula Avatar’, I haven’t managed it. All I have is a 100-word drabble teaser for that forthcoming story.

( When Your Dream Becomes Your Nightmare )

On Saturday night I felt too ill to go in to work and stayed off for the first time in four years. However I went in on Sunday and last night and will be in tonight. Being ill is just something that I’m going to have to learn to put up with.

Being ill all the time has made me feel somewhat morbid. I’m still plodding on with my WIPs but I’ve been thinking along somewhat different lines some of the time. Here is a 100-word drabble that will be the beginning of a full-length fic eventually once I’ve finished one or two of the WIPs. AtS S5. Rating PG-13 but it’s not one of my funny ones. At all.

( To Rain in Hell )

Could this be the weirdest plot bunny of all time? curiouswombat and I were talking about the odd web-searches that find their way to my site, and I mentioned that one for "spike buffy love kisses", although on the right lines, had probably not quite produced the soppy Spuffy the searcher was expecting. This led on to a discussion of the way some people will read and enthusiastically review any soppy love story in which the lead characters are given the names "Spike" and "Buffy", no matter how dissimilar they are to the characters from the show.

I gave as a hypothetical example "Buffy is the Prime Minister of Iceland. Spike is a Jivaro headhunter in the Brazilian rain-forest. Can they get together?"

curiouswombat said "You ought to write that one."

I have to admit, for a minute there I was tempted. But no. Umm. No! Get thee behind me, Plot Bunny!

I'm taking a leaf from theohara's book and offering up plot bunnies to anyone interested rather than starting yet more WIPs. So, here's one that I'd love to write but won't.

I'm a Giles/Drusilla shipper. I'd have loved to see something come of the "Becoming Part 2" kiss. So, alternative S4 scenario. Instead of reacting to Spike's Slayer obsession by shagging Chaos/Fungus Demons, Drusilla returns to Sunnydale intending to rid herself of her rival by terminating Buffy with extreme prejudice - and is captured by the Initiative and chipped. She escapes, throws herself on the Scoobies' mercy, and generally fills the Spike role in S4 onwards, but inevitably there are differences and a Giles/Drusilla romance gradually develops. Spike's own presence or absence, and chipped or unchipped status, is up to the author.

This would have to be long. It would be hard to do convincingly. But I think that in the hands of a sufficiently talented writer it could be very good indeed.

If nobody takes me up on it I'll do it after I finish all scheduled WIPs and series fics. Probably in 2007.

( Progress report on my ongoing projects )

Writing is going well on The Immigrant Song, and it should be finished in a day or two, but I've got something else on the go too. I'm going to have a go at kantayra's Challenge #8; full details on her site, but basically Dawn doesn't get cut in The Gift, all is sunshine and roses, but Spike feels he's failed and sinks into depression, yadda yadda. She puts it better.

I'm just having one of those moods in which I'm fed up of being regarded purely as a comedy and fluff writer, and I'm going to do something angsty. Not that I'm really as fluffy as everybody supposes - three or four of the Roxyverse stories are so angsty I can't re-read them myself without crying and at least one makes my flesh crawl - but nobody reads the Roxyverse so I suppose that doesn't count, and there's only "Smells Like Teen Spirit" to represent me in the non-Fluffy stakes as far as the audience is concerned. (I can't read Chapter 11 of "Pandora's Boxer" without choking up either but the dreadful things don't happen to a core Scooby so somehow they don't count, apparently)

However, I'm not going to let this new project distract me from my existing commitments, so I'm going to delay starting it until next year, probably February - March. I'm posting the first section now partly as a teaser, and partly because there are two S5 rewrites reaching their ends right now - kallysten's excellent "Heaven's Key" and enigmaticblues' more than excellent "All the Graces of the Dawn" - and I'm worried in case they've thought of the same simple one of the 147 possible ways of saving Dawn that I have, and I'm staking a claim so that even if they have I can still use it when I complete the fic. That problem doesn't exist with "Pandora's Boxer"; that's going to go completely differently and Spike isn't even going to be up the tower when we reach the end of S5 in that.

( Anyway, here's the opener of 'Alone'. It's all about failure, inadequacy, that sort of thing, y'know? )

The rest will follow once my other stories have reached the next planned break points.

Gacked from lots of people, most recently kallysten

If you happen to be working on some creative writing project, fanfiction or NaNoWriMo or what have you, post exactly one sentence from each of your current work(s) in progress in your journal. It should probably be your favourite or most intriguing sentence so far, but what you choose is entirely your discretion. Mention the title (and genre) if you like, but don't mention anything else -- this is merely to whet the general appetite for your forthcoming work(s).

I'm stretching the "one sentence" bit just a little.

( Work in Progress meme )

There's a Challenge up on Vampire Kisses which is rather unorthodox.

Challenge #3-

"Till The End Of The World"

- Make the Key into something other than human. Buffy and Spike still have to defend it with their lives and keep Glory from getting it. Must be a Spuffy story. The ending of Gifts must be intact.

Well, it's inspired me to make a start on possibly the strangest story I've ever written.

Here's the beginning as a teaser.

 

Starts at the end of Season 5 Episode 1 “Buffy versus Dracula”.

 

“Mom!” Buffy exclaimed.  “Why is there a mechanical digger tearing up the back garden?”

Joyce was talking with a balding man in an expensive suit and a hard hat construction worker with a clipboard and a fluorescent vest.  She broke off and turned to her daughter.  “They’re installing the pool, honey,” she informed her.

“We’re getting a swimming pool?  Cool!” Buffy beamed.

"Not exactly," her mother said.  "Do you remember your Great-Aunt Leonora?"

"Not really," the Slayer replied, her brow furrowing.  "Didn't she move to, like, Alaska?"

“Yes, a long time ago.  I hardly remember her myself.  She became an extremely wealthy woman, but rather eccentric.  Well, she’s died, and left us something.  An exotic pet.  There’s a bequest, a large income as long as we look after the pet, but when the pet dies the income stops and the capital goes to Greenpeace.”

Buffy looked at the excavations.  “Don’t tell me, Mom, the pet’s a polar bear.”

“Close,” Joyce admitted.  “We’ve inherited a walrus.”

 

So, what do you think?  Have I gone stark raving mad?  It'll probably only take me two or three days to finish it and then it's back to reality.  Well, not that close to reality, the next 'Violent Elizabeth Bott' story is next on my "To Do" list, and then back to "It's Got To Be Perfect".

 

So, this LiveJournal thing does seem to have some point. I've already got two Mutual Friends.

One of them might be interested to know that I've just spotted on TV a Dalek crowd-surfing at Glastonbury, to Dance Music. YOU WILL BE ECSTASINATED!

Having switched my allegiance to the Czech Republic following the disgraceful expulsion of England by a biased referee, I have had the pleasure of watching my team annhilate their opposition, despite attempts to cheat by the Danes. That Yellow Card must be wiped out!

Half the day wasted reading LiveJournal entries - this thing's quite addictive! Eventually I buckled down and made a start on the next chapter of my award-winning Buffy fic "It's Got to be Perfect". A lot of people actually post their fics here, but I'm not going to do that. But I am going to post a teaser: the opening section of chapter 11. You asked for it, magic wanderer, a long time ago, and you're going to get it.


It's Got to be Perfect Chapter 11 "All Tomorrow's Parties"

Teaser:

Buffy woke up slowly. There was a warm body snuggled close against her, their legs entwined together. She felt relaxed, comfortable, even satisfied; except for a nagging headache behind her eyes and a queasy churning in her stomach. How much had she had to drink last night? "Spike", she murmured sleepily, and opened her eyes. Blonde hair met her gaze. Hang on, blonde hair? Spike's was light brown now. And what was her thigh pressed up against? It was between her bedmate's legs; there was something she should be feeling, and it wasn't there. And what was that pressing softly against her breasts? And, for that matter, what was pressing softly against her back?

The blonde hair in front of her was long. “Harmony?” she said incredulously.

“Yeah? Morning, Buffy,” came a voice from behind her. “Wow, that was intense. I always said that if I had a threesome it would have to be boy, boy, girl, 'cept maybe with Charlize Theron, but wow. Hey, I ate a Slayer! Sorta, anyway."

"And an ex Vengeance Demon," the figure in front of Buffy added. "Hey, Buffy, that thing you did with your nipple! Fantastic. I had a really satisfying orgasm. Where on Earth did you learn to do that?"

“Anya?” Buffy gasped. And the memories came flooding back.