WIP list and LJ Spam

[sarasa_cat]

Is anyone else receiving a ridiculous amount of spam comments on their LJ posts? Although LJ seems to be catching most of them and screening them, it just makes me feel like locking down my LJ.  :/

WIP list

Active WIPs
These WIPs are being actively written with the goal of completing publication between now and March 2014:

1. A Necessary Arrangement - AU DA novelette for kinkmeme (8k-14k words), Marian Hawke/Cullen, Meredith, cast. Meredith insists on arranging a marriage between her loyal templar Knight Captain and the Champion of Kirkwall in order to keep that politically dangerous mage under Meredith's thumb. Neither Hawke nor Cullen like the idea one bit. [Status: story outlined, first chapter posted, next two chapters drafted.]

2. A Selfish Act - DA fanfic novelette for kinkmeme (8k words), Alistair/SolonaAmell/Cullen. Angry templar threesome with very angry Alistair giving Cullen orders. Solona gladly obliges.  [Status: entire first draft complete (7.5k words), waiting for final edit.]

3. A History of Lies - DA fanfic novel or collection of short stories in my main canon (?? words), Merrill/Mari Hawke, Mari Hawke/Cullen, Fenris/Anders, Cullen/IncreasingSenseOfDoubt. Always keep your enemies closest. Ten years in my canon Hawke's Kirkwall with a mage-supporting mage who decides that social justice for Kirkwall's underprivileged--mages, elves, and poor--is best served by getting Meredith out of power as quickly and as cleanly as possible, even if that means pretending to side with Meredith when Anders bombs the Chantry. [Status: entire story outlined in great detail, all key scenes drafted, some key scenes posted as preview shorts, many other drafted bits... but some of this might get pulled into my expy pile, not sure what final structure of AHoL will be.]

4. Ten Thousand Swords - DA fanfic novella in my main canon (22k words), Surana/OC, Surana/Cullen, Greagoir/Wynne, selected cast from all DA games & novels. A coming of age story about Neria Surana's attempts to improve her lot in life in a world that hates elves even more than mages. [Status: story outlined, 4000 words written, may finish for DABB?]

5. This Bird Has Flown - DA fanfic novel in my main canon (80k words?), Alistair/Surana, Surana/Cullen, DA:O cast. Alistair's memories of the Fifth Blight as a meditation on love, loss, sorrow, and friendship. [Status: story fully outlined, 10-12k 20k words drafted (found the scenes I thought I lost!)]

Inactive WIPs
These WIPs feature elements that are strongly grounded in canon so they are unlikely to be expied in a manner that makes sense as orig fic, BUT I'm not in a burning hurry to finish them.

• A variety of DAKinkMeme stories I've drafted plus a few that I've posted as shorts with the option to continue. This includes my infamous Hawke/Fenris story.
  
• Possession - FFXII novella in my main canon, Drace/Gabranth, Drace/Bergan (704-706 O.V.). Drace is married to Bergan. She has an affair with Gabranth. It ends tragically. [Status: story outlined, 2/3s posted somewhere on DW]
• Not in a Place Like This - FFXII novella in my main canon, Vossler/Basch, Vossler/Ashe (689-706 O.V.).
• Scars - FFXII novelette for a kink prompt "No holds barred," Drace/Gabranth (700 O.V.). Drace and Gabranth spar as Drace attempts to prove her strength as the only woman promoted to Judge Magister. [Status: jaysusfuck. All 15k words written. Just needs to be edited and reposted but... yeah... sigh...]
• Oh, It's You - FFXII novelette in my main canon, implied Penelo?Basch, Penelo/Tomaj, Penelo/Noah (post game). Basch stands up Penelo and Noah on the same night...for reasons. [Status: entire first draft written, 8500 words. Needs heavy editing. Probably 10K when done]

Retired/pulled/withheld WIPs
These WIPs are permanently put to sleep. If they are still online, yay. If not but you have a copy, great. If not, well... gone.

• Aveline/Kirkwall versus Athenril/Kirkwall - two strong women with very different views about what makes Kirkwall work.
• A boat load of random DA WIPs inspired by kinkmeme prompts or tossed around as ideas that didn't, in the end, get folded into my canon.
• All of my unfinished Basch/Penelo and Basch+Penelo friendship will not be continued. Some ideas of them may loosely expy in orig fic.
• All of my modern world FFXII AUs. These are being kept as expy food for orig fic
• My entire Noah fon Ronsenburg arc - Noah in Landis, Noah in the Akademy, Noah/Fran during the 690s, Fran's sudden unexpected disappearance (with Ffamran!), Noah climbing the ladder in the 9th, and paraplegic Noah surviving post-game after being dumped by Larsa and Basch into Penelo's care. This entire arc is a giant piece of expy food for my decopunk/dieselpunk ofic universe. 
• My multi-decade Ashe epic -- not sure what I will do with this. Probably to become expy food?
• Anything I've forgotten to include because there is so damn much fic scattered across my harddrive and cloud services...

Slow Burner Original Fic WIPs

• The decopunk/deiselpunk epic with ceremonial magic societies who really can work magic. ...This baby is influenced by a wide range of things (books, movies, games) and it is slowly moving from a collection of character studies to something that hangs together with an overarching plot. Most of the ideas from my Noah fon Ronsenburg arc, and my Aveline/Kirkwall+Athenril/Kirkwall have been folded into this, as have some of my Cullen/Gallows+Hawke/Cullen ideas. Still baking... tbd.
• The psychological faeryverse collection of connected short stories that cannot decide if it wants to be magical realism or urban fantasy. In a sense, this is a giant fanfic universe since it is based on actual faery tales and mythology. Some of my Basch/Penelo has been folded into this universe as has many other ideas from before I "sidetracked" myself into writing fanfic. ;)
• Two of my FFXII modern world AUs want to be folded together into a post-cyberpunk globe hopping thriller mystery that involves central asian oil barons, eastern european crime, the sex industry in america, homeless runaway/throwaway (gay) teens, and the dark side of the pharmaceutical industry. 

Comments

[owlmoose]

I've been having that problem with LJ, too, although so far it's only on much older posts (including one on my fic journal that's been defunct for 6 years?). Not the cleverest spammers around, as far as I can tell.

[sarasa_cat]

I often think the spammers aren't interested in the comments being unscreened. They know that the comments will enter my mailbox so they are at least forcing me to read their spam.

The spam arrives in waves. They pick a post and hammer it for days, go away, and then come back a week or two later. It is really annoying, especially when one post (some aren't very old) receive a half dozen spam comments in a very short period of time. :C

[ex_pendency799]

...when did A History of Lies develop a Fenders?!

LJ --> Old posts also, generally on communities as I have locked almost all my LJ apart from the relatively recent story posts. It's annoying but not more than about three per post, and then they stop.

I haven't used LJ for anything except kinkmeme posting. The ads make it so slow now anyway, unless it's a paid account it's just irritating all around.

[sarasa_cat]

I no longer have a paid account on LJ and I find it INFURIATING to use. Add in how hard it is to post to kinkmeme and daklfjaklfjaklfjaklfjaklfajfl URGHRHGHGHEHRGHRGHRHGHGHRHgkla fdklajdf lkaf.

Frustrating.

Every time I read the word "Fenders" I think about some fan whose name I cannot remember who wondered why DA fandom was so into car parts. XD

Fenders was a process of elimination thing:

1. Isabela doesn't stick around past Act 2.

2. Aveline's with Donnic. Varric's busy with his own life. Hawke turns down Anders very quickly, dallies a tiny little bit with Merrill in a non-serious manner until shacking up with Cullen. Sebastian is chaste. Carver has the hots for Merrill. Fenris broods. Anders complains.

3. I will now forever picture Anders as the late-30s/early-40s grad student living in the closet of Love House ... and I need need need Anders to have a very uncomfortable, unhealthy relationship with someone who argues with him about everything, calls him on his hypocrisy, is far more of a tease than a squeeze, and ...

Fenders. It just happened. Process of elimination.

But the relationship is a disaster. Sort of like the worst of Vossler/Basch without any of the "sweeter" moments (those moments repressed Vossler never admitted to). This Fenders is more off than on and edges into abusive territory. Not a healthy relationship. Lots of roleplaying for self-hating reasons. Really ugly shit that stands in contrast with the surprisingly healthy (albeit somewhat broken and somewhat on and off) relationship between Cullen and Hawke. And Merrill makes loopy-observant commentary that everyone except Varric ignores.

[ex_pendency799]

I never realised that the tendency to portmanteau was so intense on tumblr because / don't work in tags. So even my need to tag Anders/Fenris just does not work. Grr tumblr.

Process of elimination. So there was this scat prompt on the kmeme for them...

[sarasa_cat]

I need to search through kink meme for every humiliation prompt, filled or not, so I can collect writing fuel. (Not sure about scat, although...)

Not sure how this will work when formatted as a novel. Might format it as a series of interlocking short stories ordered in an AO3 collection (to simulate a novel's structure) because I am certain some of my readers won't want the fenders bits when told from a fenders POV. Nothing like a sweet(ish) Cullen/Hawke episode followed up with a chaser of zero safe word bondage, whipping, and humiliation that ends in hard drinking and a lot of ambiguity after Anders silently dresses and leaves.

I tag my pairings on tumblr like this: "anders x fenris"

[ex_pendency799]

The problem with kink meme tagging is the tags come mostly from explicit request. A lot of the anders/fenris prompts have so much room for humiliation that's never picked up on... :/ Fizzysplosion does some brilliant hatesex for them, but there's not a lot of internalisation as to why, just the actions.

Is it Anders that starts the "relationship" or Fenris?

I kind of picture all quote-unquote "canon" Anders/Fenris sex as fail!sex (three pumps and we're done; failure to penetrate and coming early; just complete misalignment/wrong sizing/wrong angles for everything), or sex that's so unbelievably messy it's dropsheet territory.

(Although even though after I read the scat prompt I was all, aw CRAP NOW I'VE MANUFACTURED A SCENARIO WHERE THIS HAPPENS WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF, the scat prompt reference above was me just attempting to be funny -- process of elimination = voiding one's bowels... then again, maybe Anders and Fenris wind up in Kirkwall's fledgling vocal jazz club somewhere along the way...)

[sarasa_cat]

(Makes mental note to look for fizzysploshion's fic.)

I can't remember *where* I wrote notes about how Anders/Fenris begins. It might have started in a convo with you here on DW or maybe some random thought made me make notes... and now I need to search for them. All I remember is something about Anders learning that Cullen is unofficially shacking up with Hawke and somehow he ends up in a brief, "meaningless" (but not really meaningless) encounter with Fenris.

Right now I only see snapshots of Fenders rather than an arc. All of my other canonical friendships and relationships have clear beginnings, middles, and ends in my head. I need to develop Fenders because they are nothing more than a series of really uncomfortable sexual encounters right now.

I've also pictured a lot of rapid fail!sex in/near the outhouse/bathroom at the Hanged Man juxtaposed with LONG MESSSSSSSY sessions in Fenris' mansion, no dropsheet because all of it is happening among broken glass, unidentifiable dead and rotting thinks, rain soaked plaster, and waterlogged books.

Anders ends up with visible marks on his body. Hawke nervously asks why. In response, Anders insinuates that Hawke invites Cullen over to tie her up, gag her, and roughly force himself on her. Hawke stares at Anders in wide-eyed horror, mouth snapping open and shut before she states, "We do nothing of that sort." And then Hawke turns away and ignores Anders, which is exactly what he wants.


Process of elimination. XD *dopeslap*

Honestly though, my Fenders is so psychologically broken just about anything that lands squarely into dropsheet territory makes sense. Two abused children abusing each other in a mix of self-hating punishment and pleasure. For some reason, I picture the first encounter as a fast, fail!sex dubcon that steps right up to the noncon line without truly crossing over (it's not rape because he never said 'no'). Sex purely as a mage/anti-mage power play. It *never* evolves beyond humiliation sex but both partners find a certain kind of fucked up identity-affirming release in what they do.

It's all about the juxtaposition of wannabe domestic Hawke/Cullen and dropcloth Fenders. No one is satisfied but they keep coming back. Hawke/Cullen because their relationship has a self-affirming healing quality they both need. Fenders because their relationship has a self-defining punishment quality they both crave. Hawke/Cullen are somewhat concerned about Anders (and Fenris). Donnic/Aveline are very concerned about Fenris. Fenders think Hawke/Cullen is a disgusting sickness. You know, my normal take on interesting literary juxtapositions of relationships. ;)

[ex_pendency799]

ohhhhhhhhhh totally fizzysplosion. :D http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/8469.html?thread=31665941&#t31665941 Unfinished, but all the elements are there.

Prompt is: "Anders and Fenris have an arrangement: once a week, Fenris shows up to Anders's clinic and submits to what can only be called abuse by Anders. Beatings; rough, painful sex; humiliation; the works. If Fenris weren't apparently willing, it would be indistinguishable from violent rape. At the end, Fenris is left to stagger home in pain, dripping Anders's semen down his thighs. For a week, it's as if nothing happened, and then Fenris returns and they do it again, if anything more vicious and violent than the previous week.

Anders does it because he believes Fenris deserves to be abused for his attitude towards mages. Fenris does it to help remind himself why he hates mages. It's bitter, twisted, and horrific, and a habit they can't get out of because they're in a self-feeding circle: the more Anders punishes Fenris, the more Fenris hates mages; the more Fenris hates mages, the more Anders punishes him."

I think you'll even like the Hawke in this one too, and his friendly relationship with Cullen. He only gets a couple of side lines, but it's so close to your description.

I like those triplex layers of external judgement. Can totally picture Fenris and Anders getting the hate on about Cullen and Hawke. I like the idea that Fenris also deplores Cullen for reasons of his own. I can picture Fenris approaching Cullen almost as a symbol of everything weak and wrong with templars/Kirkwallers/permissiveness/privilege.

[sarasa_cat]

Oh yes yes yes! I just started reading it *and* I've also bookmarked fizzysplosion on AO3. This is the fic I've been looking for. >}

I'm picturing the mirror image relationship for History of Lies: Anders goes to Fenris for abuse, Fenris dishes it out.

In my case, there is also some element of Fenris being angry with Hawke for *not* keeping a steady eye on The Abomination. Fenris decides he needs to watch Anders. As time passes and Anders becomes more aware of all of his lost-time/lost-memory episodes, a creepy unspoken semi-agreement occurs in which Fenris will put Anders down if Anders goes completely psycho. But no one admits to this. It's just sort of ambiguously there in the background. (Creepily mirroring a failed harrowing.) Fenris is *DOING* Cullen's job because Cullen is too weak, wishy-washy, undirected, permissive, and privileged, and has no idea the other half lives. My Cullen refuses to go into darktown (because he has allergies and sinus problems, and darktown is smokey and moldy, leaving him with killer headaches for days). Fenris only sees that Cullen refuses to go into the dirty underbelly. Cullen drinks coffee in a Hightown cafe. Cullen sings in the Chantry choir. His clothing is always spotless. He has too much education and no ability to apply it. Even worse, one day Fenris sees Cullen half-dressed (why, I haven't figured out) and Cullen isn't cut, fit, wiry, and lean. No, the man is easily one stone overweight and a goodly bit doughy in the middle. Muscle definition? None. And that's the biggest sign of weakness. Fenris is positive that Cullen would be splattered by an abomination if Cullen ever had to face one alone. As far as Fenris is concerned, the only reason Cullen survived Uldred's attack was because the blood mages kept Cullen alive as their play thing. (meanwhile, Fenris and Cullen say their canonically identical lines. ^_^)

I like those triplex layers of external judgement. Can totally picture Fenris and Anders getting the hate on about Cullen and Hawke. I like the idea that Fenris also deplores Cullen for reasons of his own. I can picture Fenris approaching Cullen almost as a symbol of everything weak and wrong with templars/Kirkwallers/permissiveness/privilege.

This discussion is making me realize how much I need to have these sorts of situations in my fic. My FFXII fic all evolved in this direction, especially all of the half-finished stuff.

In addition to everything you said, I also like to have clear counterpoints to relationships that *never* go away. Typical romance fic has a series of obstacles that the couple needs to overcome. When all obstacles are gone, they are magically glued together in eternal bliss.

I want Fenris & Anders to repeatedly remind the audience of what really is wrong with Hawke/Cullen and why their relationship is doomed to failure no matter how much the audience believes that Hawke and Cullen are good for each other. Likewise, I want the audience to feel a little disturbed about any judgment they have against Fenris/Anders -- judgements that Aveline, Donnic, Hawke, and (to a lesser extent) Cullen express. After all, what if Mari Hawke, a mage who is primarily diplo but has some biting red-aggro tendencies ended up with Fenris? (And you know how my Hawke/Fenris works out, with the potential of a dead mage discarded in an alley when Hawke does the wrong thing and Fenris looses control.) Isn't it "better" that Fenris is taking out his aggressions on Anders who is actually welcoming it? (or is it better?) I like these messy ambiguities. No easy answer, no true resolve. Just people being people, all sweaty, naked, and honest. They think they have resolve but we know they do not.

[ex_pendency799]

Ahh, pudgy Cullen is another straw for Fenris, that's brilliant. I picture Fenris being rather obsessed/impressed with his own "back muscles like rock" physique, the fact that this is his thought pattern is just a gleeful bit of twisted Tevinter vanity. How very **gladiator** of Fenris. XD (Hawke threw him over for that?!, he thinks; is Hawke trading sexual favours with the templar to keep herself free? How hypocritical of her...)

I'm now picturing all these little side/snide commentaries Anders and Fenris are making of Cullen and Hawke similar to those two old codgers/critics in the Muppets, absolutely gleeful and united when they're making mock of other people...then they turn on each other with that same scorn when it's just them. (I always picture them as really old grumpy men together, hating each other as well as everything else so much but being too old/resigned/unwilling to change to leave each other. The Fenris Mercy Beheading is just an added layer of resignation from both to the spiteful soupy mix.)

I'm so sad I missed the fandom when fizzy was around, I would have latched on like a limpet.

[sarasa_cat]

fizzy: ah. I just looked at her(?) AO3 account and nothing has been updated since March '12. Hm. Randomly scanning fizzy's fics and enjoying--marking all for later reading.

Pudgy Cullen has always been headcanon for DA2, but I've never had a good reason for using that fact until now. Yes, all Fenris is emotionally capable of seeing is Hawke trading entertainment and sex for her freedom. He is completely blind these two have a very tight friendship and enjoy each others companionship. Instead, Fenris always misreads them. I think this will be tricky to write--an interesting challenge for me--especially since I expect reader to selectively skip over certain stories in the overall collection.

Anders and Fenris are exactly like those old codgers on the Muppet Show.

[ex_pendency799]

Last night I kept thinking about where Fenris would see Cullen mostly naked; was thinking about Cullen and Mari being off on his boat picnicking somewhere (Cullen shirtless, short shorts, unselfconscious and completely at home around his boat) and Fenris gets picked to deliver an urgent message to Hawke. So he comes across them lying/snuggling on a picnic blanket in a cove and mind-blanches at sight of Cullen, then goes down and basically plonks himself on the picnic blanket between Cullen and Mari like a jealous dog. Cullen is taken aback but offers him food and tidbits of conversation, and Fenris takes everything as either an insult against elves or Tevinters or slaves while eating everything Cullen offers and making snide comments about templar training or lack of, and probably spits off to the side a few times. While Mari facepalms and wants to tell him to bugger off, except the message is actually important and she has to leave with Fenris; Fenris does all the possessive Balthier body language on her within sight of Cullen (herding, shouldering, guiding over rocks) while Mari is getting increasingly irritated at feeling dogged, Fenris finally says something like "I can't believe you're really sleeping with him, surely your fear of the Circle is not so bad to justify that" and maybe offers to kill Cullen for her. At which she experiences so many levels of wrong she can't work out what to say for a moment, then reminds him sternly about what appropriate behaviour is in a civilised country, ie you don't go murdering politically significant persons unless you want to start a war or you're in Antiva. And maybe there's even room for a couple of digs at how Cullen is better in bed, IDK. And Fenris is silent, thinking, "she's brainwashed badly into believing she needs this, poor pitiable Hawke, *I* would never stoop so low" and goes back to find Anders and swap nasty gossip.

[sarasa_cat]

Oh, this.

I can see this entire scene happening. I need to write this, especially the "while eating everything Cullen offers." Not until recently have I wanted to write to write Fenris so badly. He is such a problematic character in canon, and I want to keep him seriously problematic, but I *can* think of ways in which Fenris is sympathetic, merely because he is so (problematically) loyal.

Here's the bit about Fenris I find tricky: he has rabid hatred for Magisters and all the ways their magic has wrecked the world *but* he is clearly impressed with mage!Hawke as in "here's a real power who can go up against the world and win." I need to find good examples elsewhere (fanfic, ofic, movies, real life people) who exist with this weird, broken contradiction in them. Right now I'm at the point where I see it but I don't feel it to the point that I can write it.

I love the idea of Fenris starting off in Act 1 thinking that Mari Hawke is the kind of magister mage he wants to work for because Hawke is more impressive than all others but as Hawke becomes more and more friendly with the templars, more under Meredith's thumb, and, eventually, "brainwashed" enough to let the templar Knight Captain leash her while trading sex for something that vaguely resembles freedom but is barely a step above house arrest (or so Fenris believes). Yet, he turns around and has a problematic, abusive relationship with "weak mage" Anders, and this relationship mirrors what Fenris wrongly believes is going on between Cullen and Hawke. This whole idea is so tasty and so wrong in all the right ways.

But, it feels really tricky to write because if it is done too subtly, the reader just won't get the meta in the subtext. Hmm.