A Minor Variation

Still have not made any appreciable progress on the Redcliffe segment. This is the bit after Redcliffe, which is also after Orzammar, and thus contains spoilers for Orzammar and Redcliffe and the Brecillian Forest besides.

I did not actually mean for this past to be longer than the other parts combined. The dialogue just sort of... ran away with itself.

( How could you walk across that broken bridge? )

Speaking of that Baccano! fanfic, here's another not quite 200 words from what is probably near the end of the fic but which I am posting now because it pleases me and, hey, the series itself doesn't bother with chronological order either.

( In which Eve accepts Luck's proposal before he actually makes it, but not before he gives her time to think it over. )

I've hacked together a rough outline for "With Good Intentions," constructed from my fifty-some notecards. This may be my most ambitious project thus far!

Granted, it's a very rough outline. At several points it pretty much reads "I need another scene here but I don't know what yet." Even with that, however, the outline clocks in at about 4000 words.

This has also led me to break my brain trying to make sense of the FFVIII worldmap's hemispheres and what season it would be in Deling City if it's summer in Winhill and if Esthar even has seasons at all or if it's right smack on the equator. Probably nobody cares about this stuff but me, but I can't bring myself to just ignore the issue completely.

Current total wordcount: 6218
Target total wordcount for Nov. 5: 8335
Wordcount needed for today in order to stay on track: 2117
Failing that: 1117 so as to be no more than 1000 words behind target

First draft of "Easy as Life" complete, albeit desperately in need of revision before it's fit for anyone else to read. That'll come in December.
"Semper Fidelis" plot synopsis written, no actual writing done on it yet.
Plot synopsis of "Vigil" also written, but the order of the scenes not remotely established yet so it's basically a collection of bits on index cards awaiting reshuffling.

Next up, most likely "Right Here, Right Now" or "No Way Out." If I get stuck on those, I could also try working on "Persistence of Memory," "After the Storm," or the bit with the terrorists at the research facility, which has taken shape enough in my head that I should at least pre-write it before I forget what I had in mind.

Currently: sleepy but hopeful!

Edit: Total wordcount now is 7487, 848 behind target. Tomorrow will not be a good writing day but I'll try to keep from falling any further behind, even if I can't get caught up.

Trying to write at work is horribly frustrating. I keep getting calls which interrupt my train of thought as I'm trying to -

call

- build -

call

call - "If she has time she'll call, and if not I've done what I could," he says. There is one thing I could tell him he could do that he has not done: try not being an asshat.

Ahem.

Anyhow, you see what I mean. Trying to write at work is frequently more trouble than it's worth, unless it's a slow day. Which today is not. Which is obnoxious because one of those Andy/Murrue fics has just about come together in my head and I want to get it written and argh.

On the other hand, I can still occupy the time between calls, such as it is, by going back through old stuff. Which is kind of cool, because now and again I find some unfinished thing that really came out well. Like this, the opening to the rewrite of "After the Storm" which I swear I am going to finish.

( In which Garden's policies are REALLY CREEPY, and Rinoa doesn't like to drive. )

I have been trying to write an Andy/Murrue fic since February.

That is kind of sad.

Particularly since I really haven't made much progress worth mentioning. I have an assortment of ideas, but they have yet to gel into an actual fic. I tried a bit of semi-stream-of-consciousness noodling with just dialogue to see what I could shake loose, but I can't say it's helped all that much.

( extremely fragmentary random Andy/Murrue dialogue snippets )

The idea that I'm simmering focuses on Valentine's Day and the unique significance it holds in the SEEDverse following Bloody Valentine and the ensuing war - there's something really intriguing about seeing an established lovers' holiday turn into a day for remembering grief and loss, and the particular perspective that Andy and Murrue would have on it, having both lost the ones they loved to the war. Understanding one another's grief draws them together, but it can't be easy to build a relationship when the ghosts of both your lost loves are (metaphorically) still so present.

I don't have a storyline, just an assortment of things I'd like to explore, like how Andy, who as a Coordinator and a soldier must be accustomed to a high level of physical ability, deals with physical disability - and more significantly how he settles into a civilian life and how much he has to struggle with boredom (cribbing shamelessly from the novelization, in which he refers to boredom as "my oldest enemy" and is pleased after first fighting Kira because he's found a stimulating challenge) - how the two of them came to be living together as shown in the earlier parts of Destiny, the reason for which I imagine must have been a series of practical considerations (Andy having to get used to brand new prosthesis, Murrue needing a place to live since she can't really go back to the Atlantic Federation after deserting) carefully arranged around the more basic need to not be alone - the basic concept of the relationship, mutual support and life going on and really not being about Romance or Passion or zomg True Love because at this point they've been there and done that and don't need to cover that ground again, and God, Murrue's tired of being the one left behind - and finding the balance between honoring the memory of the one you loved, and not being so tied to those memories that you aren't really living the life that they died to protect.

And I am embarrassed at how long it took me just to hack out those last two paragraphs. :(

Edit: I also kind of want to make some use of Derek Walcott's "Sea Canes," which may be cheap of me, but...

( cut for awesome )

( Gratuitous FFVIII what-iffing lies within. )



Not entirely certain whether to scene-cut there or keep going a little longer.