have been unavoidably detained by the world

So I was talking to a friend, R, about how hard it's been for me to be in a fandom and also kind of disliking the fanfic in the fandom. Cursed Child fandom has this weird "mandatory fluff" culture and it's really hard to find darkfic, and endless angst, both of which are my candy. I've been trying to write what I want, but the truth is that I'm not a great writer and I'm glacially slow (and extremely anxious) so I haven't really managed it yet.

And R, VERY KINDLY, recced me some angsty/dark fics in Star Trek and Marvel Movies, which are the fandoms R reads in, and I'm familiar enough with both of them (I was even in Star Trek fandom, sort of, for a hot minute). But I'm not in these fandoms and I don't ship these ships.

It's so weird! It's so weird to read fic that scratch the itch amazingly. Dark angst and bad decisions and nightmares and bad communication mmmm, perfect. But I don't? Ship these ships? So Nu!Spock and Nu!Kirk keep making eyes at each other and I'm like...I don't see it but okay.

And all the Marvel fics are Tony/Steve and oh boy, I like, sometimes ship Steve and Bucky but my fave Marvel Movie fic was gen. True story! I just don't ship these people very much. IDK, it's not on purpose!

And these are WILDLY popular ships. And of course, the more popular a ship, the more fic there is. And the more fic there is, the more likely there will be fic of all sorts, including the dark angsty stuff that I love. And I am loving that part, some scenes are making me so happy.

And like, I used to be a lot more loud about not shipping things and I'm still willing to mention it in spaces like this, my space where I can say stuff, but I find it super rude to mention to people who do ship the ship. Because like, I'm not here to be convinced? And I feel like it reads unintentionally as a judgement. Which it isn't! I believe strongly in ship and let ship. I WISH I could incept myself to love fandoms and ships that are popular. It would make my life easier! In so many ways!

This isn't even the first time. I read everything Astolat writes in fandoms I understand (I think I might just be in the Astolat fandom) and I love her HP fic. But it's all Drarry. I don't ship Drarry. I sometimes stop reading the fic once the shippy stuff starts. It doesn't hit quite the same way, I think maybe she does a bit more work moving her characters through time enough so that I'm willing to suspend my disbelief a bit more. Or maybe her writing style just hits so exactly on my target.

But IDK. I'm enjoying having some new fic to read which I am assured is the kind of stuff I want in fics right now. I just wish I could get it more in my fandoms I guess? Back to reading this epically amazing Kirk/Spock fic where luckily Kirk is a perfect trash fire.

__

lannamichaels has given me a ton of excellent fic recs but I find the unfamiliarity of the fandom too overwhelming so I'm saving them. I have absolutely gotten into a fandom fic-first (Inception, and a little bit Torchwood) so like...it's possible! I just have to be up to it apparently.

So I've gone back and picked the second fic to post. I posted two parts of it and then just...failed to post the rest (it's a five times fic). I THOUGHT I had finished it but actually part 5 is pretty unpolished, so going back and working through it is going to be tricky. (It's, uh, 45 pages long on google docs. So it's a decent five times fic, and I'm excited to actually finish and post even if it isn't perfect.)

( Some musings about what went wrong, just as a record for myself I guess. Reference to fictional character death below. )

This is all a long way to say that...I got hurt, in fandom. It wasn't a big hurt, objectively, but it hit me hard. And I think it's why, as DESPERATE as I am for recognition in fandom (what fic writer isn't??) I'm also pretty scared of being noticed. I haven't reached out to my old fandom friends, even if fluff is exactly the kind of stuff they could like.

Right now it's almost like I'm a fandom of me, my beta, and the really excellent people who encourage me even though they aren't in my fandom at all. And I'm so, so happy for each and every one of you, you have no idea. ♥

One of my favorite things about posting fic on blogging platforms is the fact that it encouraged a culture of commenting and engagement you just can't find on AO3 or tumblr or even twitter. Livejournal pre-dated things like "like" and "kudos" buttons and I havne't been subtle about missing the culture of conversation.

That said, you know what LJ/blogging platforms were terrible at? Archiving. I've been living a low-scale panic for a few years now about all the fic that is slowly disappearing off livejournal for years, and handling it by....well, mostly by ignoring it. So I finally opened some tabs of a few fanfic authors I don't think have their stuff cross-posted to AO3 (where I IRRATIONALLY believe that the authors are less likely to take it down??) and started trying to save stuff. It's so hard! I have to decide if I want to copy/paste into word documents or just use Evernote, which is faster but just as prone to being taken down because it's based on the ~internet. And there are formatting preservation questions I just don't have the energy to address. Mostly, though? It's just slow. So very slow.

AND THEN OF COURE I end up going through the comments sections and reading these long paragraphs of conversation between the readers and the writers, exploring ideas and chatting away and then I get really emotional. I was never the most prolific (or particularly good) person at writing fic and meta, but I miss chatting away in the comments of fics by my favorite authors. I wish I had a good idea of a straightforward way to document the comments as well as the fics. They are just as much a part of fandom culture and history, so much of which which is being lost over time.

I think one of my favorite things about reading fanfic is the ideas in the fics. Like, reading Harry Potter stuff now, it's just enormously fun to read people's idea of how the Wizarding World works and exploring all the background world-building that JKR put in her works. It's like when I read nancybrown's Intersecting Geodesics, and she had younger-in-the-future Jack react to a modern day suit like fetish wear, it was such a clever detail on how a world might work a little differently. It's the little bits that on their own would be a twitter post or a tumblr headcanon bit, but when they are just woven into the backgrounds of fics they make the fics just sparkle with depth and brilliance. Fandom, you are my favorite.

This is probably why I want long and plotty fanfics right now, because those are the ones that tend to have the cleverest ideas nestled into the longer story.

I think I managed to do it just the once, when I had Ianto and Tosh make a perpetual motion machine as a background thing in a Torchwood fic. It was just me trying to flavor their characters, but I'm still quite proud when I think about that little moment.

Anyway, link to this fic for posterity, to remind me why I thought of this post in the first place. The author's vision of Azkaban is fascinating and detailed and nuanced. And it's hitting at the right time because my anger over the need for criminal justice reform in the real world is definitely leading me to think about Azkaban a LOT. For example, the books seem to indicate that people spent most of their time in something like solitary confinement, which is absolutely cruel and inhumane and makes me furious when I think about it too long. But what alternatives were there? Mealtimes supervised by the dementors? Feels unlikely. Lots to think about. And finding a fic that really digs into this idea at this point is hitting all my happy brain buttons. *cuddles fanfiction forever*

That moment when you are reading an awesome, plotty fanfic that so far fits seamlessly into canon and then-BAM. Left turn to WHAT JUST HAPPENED NO WAIT GO BACK I WAS NOT EXPECTING THIS.

Is there a fanfic flamingo for this moment? Because talk about whiplash.


***

For posterity, and my future self, the fic is Leave Out All The Rest and the title is actually a clue for this moment of OMG WTF, not that I would have seen it at the time.

***

ETA: I just left a comment on a fic posted in 2011. On the one hand, it's easier, because the odds of the author reading it are pretty low, and the odds of a response are even lower, so I can rebuild up internet-stranger-confidence that way!

On the other hand, there is a slight TERRIFYING chance that the author will see it, panic, and will take down all their fic. Don't laugh. It happens. Dead fic links make me SO SAD.

Ok, I'm at 97 words, just a few more, careful...

100 WORDS STOP WRITING STOP READ IT OVER.

Ooooh, those are extra words, cut 'em out. Replace with BETTER WORDS.

Lalalala, editing, this is great.

HOW DID I GET DOWN TO 96 WORDS.

Write moar words!

OH NO 100 WORDS AGAIN STOP STOP DANGER DANGER!

***

Put on repeat for three days because drabbles.

This is basically the first time I have ever felt invested in Draco. Sure, Makani's fanart made me have a lot of thinky thoughts about the Malfoy family overall (and definitely shaped my long-term view of them), but after feeling horrible for Draco in books six and seven, he wasn't exactly at the forefront of my mind.

Now?

( SPOILERS )

Might have to dust off some Harry Potter fic writing skillz and write something for myself. I haven't done this in a while.

But hey, I recently got a comment on my dead, ancient Marauder fic basically demanding more. Which, because it's on ff.net, came off as more amusing than irritating. Hi commenter! It's nice to know ff.net is still ticking! (Actually, HP fandom seems pretty alive on ff.net, to my mild horror.)

I know, I know. If I want fic, I'm going to have to write it. Unfortunate, because I hate my writing. *sigh*

So, I follow this one Inception fic writer on tumblr because I really like a lot of her stories and she updates fic snippets on her tumblr and I don't have the patience to wait for it to get to AO3 ten months later. She has built some really interesting universes, that kind that I sometimes think about walking to school.

A few days ago she asked if anyone had headcanons of her work and I was like "OH BOY DO I."

So I sent her an anon message mentioning that I have headcanons for this slow-build fic universe she has. She said I should share them. For science.

And now.

Her followers.

Are asking about me.

I have a nickname.

And I've never written any of them down? I have headcanon daydreams in a lot of fandom universes, but actually building a fic involves time and editing and I'm teetering uncertainly between just hiding away in my anon-ness (no one will find this here, it's livejournal) or actually just jotting down my ideas and sending them over. I know how those other fans feel. But in case it isn't obvious yet, I haven't written fic in a while.

*teeters*

Dear Self,

No, stop writing fanfic, do not open your fanfic folder to dig up old stuff, stop it, YOUR LAST FINAL IS ON TUESDAY JUST HOLD ON.

Sincerely,

You actually like employment law, STUDY FOR IT.

I have now downloaded every article on this page through 2007.

It looks like there is a law review article about how fans are Not OK with other fans borrowing original ideas in their fanfiction, an incongruity I've long found heat-tilt worthy. WELL NOW AN ACADEMIC WILL TELL ME WHY. IN LIKE THE MID-AUGHTS.

If I read all of these articles, do I get a super-special OTW badge? I feel like I should. YOU HEAR ME, OTW?