Fanfic - Memories

Finished putting all my fanfic into memories. There are a whole 14 pieces of fic that I've written on my journal! That's just under three a year since I began this - and while my fic output is small, it sure isn't that small! Plus, they're mostly drabble length and one is pretty much crackfic ("Whiskey in the Jar" slash. Yes, really.) I think I'll dig up other things I've written and put them here so they're all in one place.

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I've loved "Life in a Northern Town" since the first time I heard it - saw it, really, on MTV, back in late 1985 or early '86, shortly after moving to Texas. It made me homesick (and youngest sister felt the same), even though it was about a northern town in England, not the US.

Kind of a busy Saturday tomorrow and I should probably go to bed. I wish sleep was optional!

Reflections (My First Fanfic)

I dabbled with fanfic since I was 13 or 14 (Mary Sue! Mary Sue!) This is the first serious attempt I made and the first I finished. It's from sometime in the 1990s - after the Star Trek - Generations movie, anyway. Though I did write it on the back of an envelope, I suffer no delusions that it's a Gettysburg Address!

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Reflections

He died peacefully, so I am told - although a century of acquaintance with the doctor causes me to question that statement. Surface appearances notwithstanding, he was never, to my knowledge, at peace.

I confess to surprise at the news of his death. Not to the death itself - 145 years is old age for a human, even in this century. The surprise is that I did not know of it until I had been told. We had been close in the past - he had held my soul - and I had always assumed that I would be aware of his death when it occurred. Assumptions are not logical.

I knew when the captain died - I felt the severing of our bond like a physical blow. I knew that he had not died on the Enterprise B as history states, yet I also knew that retrieving him was beyond our power. I told no one. I wanted to spare their feelings. When he died in the nexus - decades after the historical "fact" - I knew it and then I mourned; not before.

That statement is not strictly accurate. I had mourned the unfortunate - and I must admit, unthinkable - passing of our friendship years before.

I grieved more deeply for the doctor. I am not ashamed to say this. Even my father's people will admit to grief, if only ritualistically, and over the years I have become able to acknowledge emotions as easily as my mother's people will - though only to a few. He was one. He would say that throughout the decades I have learned to "live easy in my skin". (An interesting turn of phrase.)

There was a time - long in the past now - when I would not have believed anyone who told me that I would one day regard the doctor as closer than those of my blood and that I would miss him when he was gone. However, when a man holds one's life in his hands, it changes the relationship of necessity. More so when it is the eternal life that he holds, as the doctor once held mine. Since that time, we have both learned to acknowledge the respect we had always held for each other and the friendship that grew from it through the years. When our friendship with the captain was broken, the friendship between the two of us grew. Even when we no longer had contact - when I "disappeared" on Romulus to facilitate what I had hoped would be a reunion between my people and the Romulans - there was still a bond. And so I always thought that I would know.

The doctor was a troubled man, never at peace as long as I knew him.

Perhaps that is why we clashed so often when we first met. Perhaps we each saw the turmoil hidden inside the other - mine behind my unemotional facade, his behind his cynical one - and fought against it, as we could not fight our own. It has been my observation that humans are often most antagonized by the traits in others that they dislike in themselves. (I am no longer young enough or arrogant enough to deny my human self.) I have been able to achieve inner peace, putting away the turmoil that was so much a part of my earlier life. I doubt that the doctor ever attained the same good fortune. I am sure that he did not, as the Earth poet said, "go gentle into that good night."

Redeeming Love (Spike Ficlet)

A vignette I wrote back in 2003 and posted, I believe, to the Bloody Awful Poet list. Definitely AU!

Redeeming Love

It had been a long fight, but a good one, uphill all the way but with more rewards than he could ever have imagined. As the end drew near, the action went into slow motion and Spike remembered the people who had finally believed in him and loved him and allowed him to become what he was now. He remembered the small blonde woman who had fought him and fought beside him, tried to kill him then learned to love him and who had eventually become his wife and later left him a widower. He remembered the sister-in-law who would, he knew, miss him and
mourn him but who was a strong woman with family of her own and who would carry on. He remembered the red-haired witch and her quiet lover, "the birds" he'd called them, who had moved to his homeland with the Watcher. The Watcher was gone. The ex-demon he'd spent the final years of his life with had mourned him more deeply than he'd ever seen anyone mourn before and then one day the whelp had phoned her and in middle age they were able to find the abiding love that had eluded them in their younger years. He smiled, remembering them all and loving them as much as he ever had.

He didn't want his life to end, no matter how large the hole his love had left when she'd been killed doing what he was doing now. But, just as had happened to her, someone had come along that was a little bit faster, a little bit stronger. Not a lot, but enough to let the stake slip through his defenses. He'd never made a secret of the fact that he was still a vampire no matter how much good he'd done in the past decades, and the enemy always tried to take advantage of that fact. Now, on a late Sunday evening in early winter, in an old churchyard with the wind crying through the bare trees, the end was here.

Just as the action sped back from slow motion to real time, Spike's ears registered the words of the song carried on the wind from the church next door. "...and shall be till I die. Redeeming love has been my theme and shall be till I die."

And as the dust o'ertook him, he smiled.

Death in Doc Martens (Spike)

Another story I posted to BAP in, I think, 2003. Pre-Sunnydale Spike. (And now I must go to bed; I have to be up in 8 hours.)

Death in Doc Martens

He approached the young girl sitting by herself on the swing which hung from a large tree in the front yard. The house was set back from the road on a large plot of land with trees hiding it from the houses on either side. There was only one light on inside and the porch light barely extended to the treeswing. He couldn't believe his luck, coming upon such a tender morsel all alone and unwatched in the twilight. As he crept quietly closer, the girl stopped swinging. She looked up and looked right into his eyes. "Hello," she said. "You're him, aren't you?"

"I'm who, pet?" he asked, stopping his approach and answering the girl in spite of herself.

"The Angel of Death," she answered solemnly. "Mom said you'd be coming for her soon. She said it's about time 'cause she's worn out and tired."

"No one welcomes the Angel of Death, pet," he said. Why he was holding a conversation with this child instead of having her for starters was beyond him, but here he was.

"Mom will," the girl answered. "She's tired all the time and sometimes I think I can see through her, she's so thin. She hates being bald and hates wearing a wig and the doctors can't help her anymore, anyway. So if you go inside, she won't be afraid."

"Do you want your mother to die?" he asked, puzzled by her matter of factness.

"No. But she's going to no matter what and I hear her at night, praying for you to come. It hurts her all the time, the cancer." She was silent for a moment, head bowed, and he stood there, watching. Then she lifted her head and looked at him again, hope flaring in her eyes. "Can you make her better, instead?"

He didn't know why, but he didn't want to disappoint this girl. But he couldn't bring himself to lie to her, either. "Sorry, love, not my department. Can't help there." Bloody wanker, he thought to himself. Just eat her and go. But he didn't move.

The light went out of the girl's eyes. "Oh. I thought maybe . . . but I guess that would take a different kind of angel."

"So you and mum - you're here alone?"

"Just for a little bit. Mrs. Kowalski stays with us and cooks and helps mom out. She had to go to the store though. She'll be back soon. Mom's on the sofa. I hope she's sleeping, but probably not."

"And didn't mum or Mrs. Kowalski ever tell you not to talk to strangers?" Especially strangers that could have you for a snack then have the adults as a main course.

"Of course!" Her voice was scornful. Did he think she was stupid? "But it's ok to talk to angels. Even the Angel of Death. Are you going to go to mom tonight? 'Cause the doors unlocked and you can just go right in. Unless you just walk through doors or something," she added thoughtfully.

He didn't say anything, just stood and stared at this precocious girl who didn't take her eyes from his. She seemed far too old to occupy such a tiny body. Finally he said, and his voice faltered a bit as he said it, "No pet, I'm not going in just now. I'm just checkin' the place out, that's all. So I know where it is when it's time, you see."

The girl didn't say a word. They looked at each other for a moment longer, then he turned and headed down the front walk. Just as he reached the street, he heard the girl say, as if to herself, "I'm glad mom's not gonna die just yet. But I know she wants to. And Mrs. Kowalski said that in heaven, mom'll be like she was before she got sick and I can see her again someday." She sighed and he heard the quiet movement of air as the swing started again.

Just leave, he told himself. Forget the little witch and her sickly mum - who probably won't taste good anyway - and head downtown. You know there'll be a bar or a back alley or someplace with plenty of fast food waiting. But he turned and strode up the walk, duster billowing out behind him like black leather wings, yellow hair glowing in the faint light from the porch. The girl on the swing slowed but didn't stop. He could hear her quiet sob but she didn't try to stop him. He opened the door.

Steam Trek!

Someone posted this link on one of the Star Trek communities and it's too good not to share.

Steam Trek