EDIT: Double-post fixed.

In honor of St. Patrick's Day have a story I wrote mostly last year, but
never got around to editing and posting until now. It's very appropriate
for the season, and, oddly enough given my history, not Good Omens,
but Pirates of the Caribbean.

( To spare my flist )

"...a pirate's life for me, yo ho!" Elizabeth sank, breathless, down onto the
damp sand. Across from her Jack Sparrow ambled to a stop, swaying slightly,
and for a moment, the only sounds were their panting breaths, the lapping of
the tide, and the occasional far-off squawk of a bird.

Elizabeth opened her eyes and stared into the multicolored flames of the
driftwood fire. "I still don't understand how you can have an island that
can only be found by someone who has been there before. I mean, how would
anyone ever find it in the first place? And then how would you find
it?"

Jack leered at her as he walked closer. "I'm Captain Jack Sparrow. I know
these kinds of things. I'm legendary for it. The Sea talks to me, and she
tells me things, and one night, when I'd been sweet talking her, she told me
the secret of the island."

"Hmph. Not likely," she snorted. "You probably stole a map off some other
pirate one night. An island that can't be found except by those who have
been there before, ha!" A triumphant finger pointed his way.

"Oh yes, I have to admit, it certainly isn't a logical sounding
thing, is it?" Captain Jack stood almost behind her, the beads and bones
and feathers braided into his hair swaying slightly in the sea wind. "Of
course, I could tell you the real story of how I discovered the
island, but I doubt you'd be believing me, you being the sort of
logical person who doesn't believe in ghosts and curses and assorted
illogical things like that."

Elizabeth glared at him as best she could, given the way he was starting to
fuzz out around the edges in her vision. Perhaps she might have had just a
bit too much rum? No, she decided, it was merely the result of the
flickering firelight and Jack's inability to keep still--constantly flinging
an arm out or cocking his head at her or fluttering his fingers wildly like
the birds of his namesake. "Tell me then," she said.

Jack paused for another swallow of rum. "Well, I would tell you," he
smiled, "but then I'd have to kill you."

Elizabeth snorted. "You said yourself that we'll most likely die on this
island within a fortnight. I hardly think now is the time for secrets."

"There's always time for secrets," Jack reprimanded her. "But I
suppose it couldn't hurt to while away the time with this one. You see, it
all began in a bar."

"A bar," Elizabeth repeated, for clarity, struggling to sit upright.

"A bar," Jack agreed. He gazed off into the blue and yellow flames of the
fire. "It was called...


"It was called the Mucky Duck or the Greasy Goose or some such filthy fowl.
I can hardly be expected to remember the name of every pub or tavern I have
frequented over the course of my life, now can I? I was sitting there,
several years ago, drinking..."

"Rum," Elizabeth interjected.

"Yes, rum. As I said, I was sitting there, drinking rum, when I noticed a
very short man sitting in the corner. Now, when I say very short, you are
probably thinking of the eunuch-- sorry, sorry--Will, and that is not at all
what I am trying to get across. I mean short. Very short. Very
very very very very short. 'Bout...this big." He gestured unsteadily towards
the ground.

"I can't tell how big that is, your arms keep moving," Elizabeth complained,
trying hard to focus her eyes.

Jack peered down at his arms as they stuck out the salt stiffened sleeves of
his shirt. "Do they? Ah, good, thought per'aps it was just me. Anyway,
there, in the corner sat this very very very... very short man. And I
thought, hello, Jack, you should go over there and see what he's
doing here. 'Cause I recognized him, savvy?"

"What...what was his name? Because then, if I meet him, I can ask him how
short he is."

He scowled. "I don't know his name. Why would I know his name? Or wait...
maybe I do know his name...maybe he told me...I don't remember. Anyway, 's
not important." He waved the question aside impatiently. "I mean, I
recognized what he was. One of the sidhe."

Elizabeth blinked owlishly. "What?"

"Sidhe. The Fay. The Old Folk. Piskies and goblins and brownies and
boggarts and such."

She snorted. "Are you trying to tell me you believe in fairy tales?"

"Are you trying to tell me you don't believe in ghosts?"

"Fair enough." She raised the bottle in acquiescence. "So tell me about
your sidhe."

"My sidhe, as you so picturesquely put it, and I wouldn't ever
mention that phrase in front of one of them if you'd like for your pretty
little head to remain attached to your body, was, as I said, very very
short, and very very wrinkled and very very ugly. Uglier even than your
honorable Commander Norrington, and that's saying something."

"I happen to think Commodore Norrington is a very attractive man."

Jack smiled, flashing white teeth against sun-darkened skin as he sank onto
a log next to the bonfire. "No, your father thinks that, which ought
to prove my point to you. But. I digress. The sidhe was dressed in grimy,
ragged clothes that looked as though they might have been a dark green at
one point early in their life, and that, combined with the line of emptied
glasses in front of him, told me what I had here. I was looking, you
realize, at a real, live leprechaun."

"Wasn't he rather far from home?"

"That was what I asked. You would be surprised, he said, about the
number of places in the world leprechauns may be found. They have to move
about, you see, with their treasures."

"Treasure," she breathed, eyes wide and lips parted in anticipation.

Jack's answering grin was sharp as a dirk. "You are a pirate! I
knew it in me bones." He took another swig. "But, aye, treasure. It's the
leprechaun's job to guard hidden treasure, you know. They're tricky sods,
alright, but you can get around 'em if you know how to handle them." He
leant back against the driftwood.

"And how do you handle them?" Elizabeth asked, curious despite
herself.

"I'll tell you then, Elizabeth, me lass, in case you ever meet up with a
leprechaun of your own. First, you join him for a drink or two. Or three.
Or four. Now, mind you, this is not strictly necessary, but it does tend to
make the ensuing procedure a bit more amusing for all concerned. Then, you
wait until you can catch his eye, and you lock your stare on him so he can't
look away. That's when you tell him to lead you to his treasure. Oh, he'll
try to wiggle out of doing it, but you just keep your eyes fixed on his and
he'll give in and lead the way. Now, this is the tricky part--you can't take
your eyes off him for a second while's he leading you, or he'll vanish,
poof, just like that."

"Poof. Poof, poof, poof," she repeated like an echo, trailing off into the
night and the lapping of the waves.

"Yes, yes. Poof. Here one minute, gone the next."

"I know what that feels like."

"Are you crying?" Jack sat up and crawled over to where Elizabeth sprawled
on the sand. "Look, here, have some more rum, it'll make you feel better.
And let me finish my story; it's bad luck to leave a story unfinished."

She brushed her eyes and took the bottle he offered her. "It is?"

"Well, of course. Don't be daft; even you must know that. So where was I?
Oh, yes. I'd found me a leprechaun. And I was making him lead me to his
treasure. It was a big treasure, he promised. More gold than beyond my
wildest imaginations. You haven't seen the size of my imagination, I
assured him. But it was on a island, he explained, and he had no boat.
What luck, I cried, clapping him on the shoulder, that you should have
happened to stumble across Jack Sparrow, the finest sailor and pirate in the
whole East Indies, and owner of my very own sloop.

"I'm sure he thought that sometime during that sail I would have to take my
eyes off him, to tend the boat or sleep or rest my eyes, but I knew he was
counting on that, and I outsmarted him. We sailed, in that little sloop,
for seven days and seven nights, and that whole time I never slept, nor
rested, nor even blinked. When my eyes would get tired I would close first
one eye, then the other, always making sure I kept him in sight.

"And so, that way, we came to the island. Isla de Muerta, he said it was.
The Island of Death. Well, I'd heard the stories. You couldn't be a pirate
and not hear the stories. The island that nobody can find except
those who've been there before. And here I was standing foot on it, and
knowing it was chock-full of treasure and knowing I could come back
to it, but not how.

"See, the leprechaun had steered us there in the first place, and me with no
sort of compass or map to track his wild course couldn't find my way back.
And I saw his plan then--if I left, I wouldn't be able to come back, and if I
didn't leave, I'd starve to death.

"But they don't call me Captain Jack Sparrow for nothing, so I thought up a
plan even cleverer than his. I crept out a good silver pin from the hem of
my coat, and when he wasn't looking, I pricked him with it, hard, so that
the blood flowed out like cheap ale. And then I let that blood dry on the
pin, and put it in my hat for safekeeping, because I knew his blood would
always point the way back to his treasure. And when I got back to Port
Ascencion, I got a tinker fix my silver pin into a compass for me, and set
off to look for a crew to go back and fill up all that gold that hadn't fit
into me sloop."

"So you got off the island then," she murmured rubbing a hand over her face.

He slung an arm round her shoulders. "'Course, luv, or I wouldn't be here
spending this fine night with you, now would I?"

"But if you were there, on the island, I mean, why didn't you take the
cursed gold then? I mean, well, were you just lucky?"

He leaned back and gave her a roguish grin. "Oh, well, I've always been a
lucky sort. Except with women. And mutinies. And money. And the British
Navy. And that one time in Singapore..."

"Ha!" Elizabeth pointed a wavering finger at him. "You"re not lucky at
all."

Jack's smile grew grimmer. "Considering that our lives are depending upon
us being lucky enough to spot a ship passing through, I wouldn't cast such
aspersions upon me luck, now would I?" He took a long pull from the bottle.

"And I was lucky enough to find a leprechaun, and to find Isla de Muerta and
to not get turned into the undead, so I'd say I'm pretty bloody lucky," he
pointed out. "Besides, it wasn't luck that got me onto my sloop with
nothing more cursed than a hangover. It was skill. After all," Jack closed
his eyes and puffed out his chest, "I'm Captain Jack Sparrow."

A growling snore broke the quietness, and Jack opened his eyes to find
Elizabeth tilted against him, her mouth gaping open as she slept. "Aye,
well, lass, I'll find us someway out of this one too." He patted her
shoulder and settled down more comfortably. "You can bet on it." He yawned
and closed his eyes. "First thing in the morning... or possibly the late
afternoon."

Against the crackle of the fire and the lapping of the waves, two loud
snores competed for attention.

Yay! More fic. Except there's only about five people in the Shinesman fandom, which is sad. Sure the OAV is hilarious but the manga is pretty and funny and features slashiness galore. Read it! Read it now! Demand that someone pick it up and translate it! It will be worth it!

Written for pyro_rebel.
Prompt: Baby, you make me wanna walk... like a camel!
Fandom: Shinesman

( Every Seven Seconds )

For your, uh, enjoyment?

Naruto:

( Shikamaru )

( Sand Sibs )

Bleach

( Orihime )

And in honor of Campfuckudie:

my pain runs too deep
girl!Neji and Itachi
are not writing pr0n

Fandom: Bleach
Warnings: Crack fic. Brain breakage. I am warning you, STAY AWAY.
Pairing: Tessai/Don Kanoji (see, FOOL, I meant that warning!)

Inspired by a not-late-enough-to-use-as-an-excuse IM conversation with Becca.

( Crackfic Herein )

I haven't posted fic in a loooooooong time. Enjoy, then, the cracked-out fruits of my first foray in Naruto fandom.

( Read more... )

My Yuletide story got recced.

On the tomomichi blog.

I've read that blog before.

OMGWTF HOW DID THIS HAPPEN???

(Rec is here, btw.)

(She liked the characterization! And Maru and Moro! *stares in disbelief a bit more*)

(I need a dumbfounded icon! For now, just assume my ox is broken...with SHOCK!)

EDIT OF DOOM SHOCK AND AWE: Holy shit, someone else recced me too! When did this happen people? I thought I *read* all the reccing posts on yuletide!

NEXT EPISODE OF THE AMAZING EDIT: Dude. A third rec? There must be a severe lack of XXXholic fic out there. (*thinks* Actually, yeah, there is a shortage. I tried looking when I first got the assignment.)

Okay, so taking pyro_rebel's advice, and deciding to write some every day this year (starting today), I worked on my Buffy/X-men crossover at lunch. The Good News: I got Xander's voice back, easy as pie. The Bad News: Now he won't shut up, and I'm at work, and I really need to work and instead I'm getting (very tastefully veiled, and now I have an image of Xander in a veil doing a belly dance, thanx brain) Xander/Ethan smut in my head. Because, you know, I am a freak.

(And so is Xander. *phbbbt*)

Works-In-Progress Meme

Not that I've been progressing much lately. But hopefully, eventually,
these will make it to the finished state:

( WIPs: )

Well, I'm probably the only one out there to enjoy this, but just in case.

Sort of a "how Hakkai got his limiters and made it down the mountain to lie
dying in a ditch for Gojyo to find and rescue" fic. Will make no sense if
a) you haven't seen/read those parts of Saiyuki that explain how Gojyo and
Hakkai first met, or b) haven't read any of the Discworld books,
particularly the Ankh-Morpork books and/or The Thief of Time.

( On with the silliness )

Bwahahaha. Yes. I have finally descended into the depths of FMA ficdom.
Be afraid, be very afraid.

( Love Potion #9 )

I just checked over it for major spelling/grammar mistakes, not any real
editing, so if it sucks, you can always just pretend it would get better
with editing. ^__^ And tomorrow is my mom's birthday! I have to get her a
gift! *flails about in indecision*

My grandfather is home from the hospital (came home Easter Sunday) and doing much better. I, on the other hand, am being tormented by allergies and sinuses. Hopefully they'll hold off tomorrow evening long enough for me to enjoy my night. I'm going with a bunch of other cast and crew members to watch "The Foreigner" at Orange, TX.

I've also been writing Good Omens drabbles, including a strange sort of mind-meld psychic collaboration with pyro, born of a conversation in which we both confessed our secret desire to see Agnes Nutter/Shadwell fic.

( Crowley feels funny )

( Hastur/Ligur--At least it isn't mono )

( The Them )

( Completely shameless Agnes/Shadwell )

I know I should write more, but I'm tired, my throat hurts, and I'm going to bed.

Benjamin Franklin, while a minister to France, first suggested the idea for Daylight Savings Time in an essay titled "An Economical Project for Diminishing the Cost of Light." The essay was first published in the Journal de Paris in April 1784.

( Here's how he got the idea: )

Okay, so mainly this is just a chance for a GIP, but, you know, also to torment all the non-Becca people out there who haven't seen this yet. Because as usual? Becca is evil and my crack pimp.

-----

“You know, I knew They’d be a bit upset about all that…” Aziraphale waved his hands in vague circles, “…kerfluffle, but I didn’t think They’d be this angry.”

“Really,” Crowley drawled, looking up from where he’d been poking at his new body irritably, “what on earth could have made Them so upset about the field agents of Heaven and Hell cooperating to prevent the Apocolypse! I have no idea.” He went back to muttering blessings under his breath and examining his new shape with a scowl.

“But still, my dear, isn’t this a bit much? I mean, even for Them?” He sank down into a crouch, edging gently downwards onto the grass until he was sitting. Aziraphale felt himself tilting backwards and quickly braced himself on his hands. Oh dear, yet another drawback of this body, no stability.

Crowley paced as best he could, his knees bending stiffly and his steps short. “You, at least, are still in approximately the same shape as before.” He slewed a glance over at Aziraphale to see if he had properly appreciated the insult, but the angel (and such a little thing as a body couldn’t keep him from thinking of Aziraphale as an angel—or more specifically as his angel, but no amount of torture with white hot pokers and Barney marathons would make him admit that) appeared to be lost in thought. Very thoroughly lost in thought. Forget simple maps or even global positioning devices, this was the sort of lost that first required ascertaining which galaxy one was in. Crowley sighed and returned to trying his hardest to will a black suit onto his body.

Aziraphale was thinking. Very, very slowly. What he was thinking was, “This isn’t right.” No, not the new body thing-—that he could imagine all too well as something his superiors would find amusing (for divine beings they had loathsome senses of humour)-—but this… this…. He struggled to put words to the concept. Thinking. Slowly. It was hard. He gasped as the implication finally revealed itself to him. “Crowley!” He turned to the demon in wide-eyed shock. “I’m stupid!”

Crowley was tempted to mutter something along the lines of “It took you this long to figure that out?” but held himself back heroically. There was always the chance that the angel’s people hadn’t thought to put limits on his powers and he’d end up scorched, and in this body that didn’t seem like a good idea. “You’re not stupid,” he said. “Or at least not any more than you normally are. So what if the brain in that thing is a little slower than you’re used to? It’s like…” he paused, searching in his mind for an apt description, “it’s like driving a Mini when you’re used to an Aston-Martin. Sure, it’s not as nice as what you’re used to, and it will take you a while to get used to how it handles, but it’ll still get you to where you want to go.” He stopped suddenly, feeling foolish. He must have been hanging out with the angel far too much lately. Or maybe this body just had some sort of inherently sweet nature. Yeah, that sounded about right for those bastards Down There.

Aziraphale looked touched, and he smiled up at Crowley. “Thank you, Crowley, that was very nice of you.”

Crowley blanched and scowled. “Don’t mention it.” But that goofy smile still hadn’t cleared itself off Aziraphale’s new face, and he looked like he was about to open his mouth to administer a new set of humiliating comments about Crowley’s ‘niceness,’ so the demon quickly wracked his brain for something to distract the bugger before he got a lecture about all his wonderful inner qualities.

Crowley smirked as he thought of just the thing and flung himself down on the grass beside Aziraphale, pushing the angel back so that he lay breathless on the ground. “So,” he whispered, licking the side of Aziraphale’s face and rubbing his hands over the smooth, curving plane of his bright yellow shell, “care to find out if we really do melt in the mouth but not in the hand?”

So. Happy New Year, y'all! It's been an interesting and for the most part fun year. I worked a lot, learned some new stuff, visited Becca and Marla (yay!), wrote a *whole* lot more than I ever did before, found some new fandoms, finished Nano (if not exactly my novel), read a bunch, acted like an idiot a fair amount, and got never enough sleep. So all in all, a good year.

Now that it's 2004, I can officially let you know that the yultide story I wrote is here and is a Neverwhere fic about Old Bailey's origins. It didn't happen this way, but it could have. I can also say that the gift fic I received is by bethbethbeth who is a wonderfully nice person (I've skimmed her lj on friendsfriends lists) and a member of lower_tadfield, so it's all friendly coinkidinks and small worlds and such. I shall have to email her a nice long, drawn out thank you for the story now. I also received a lovely comment (finally! a comment! yay! I am so pathetic! ^_^) on my story from forevergeek who is also a hoopy frood who knows where her towel is and who wrote the brain-breakingly plausible Marvin/Trillian story "Attachments."

I had, at one point, planned to do yuletide recs, but I'm too lazy. If one were to wish to read a selection of good, fun fics, however, then one could just read everything under the Discworld, HHGG, Sandman, and Good Omens categories. Oh, and the Chronicles of Chrestomanci story where I don't even know the characters and I still loved it. Or maybe some of the Breakfast Club and Dead Poets Society stuff I poked around in and liked. And others, I know, but I'm just quoting off the top of my head.

And now they have the New Year's Resolution list up, and I am having to mentally slap my hand from going "Oooh, oooh, I could write *that* one!" for every fandom on there that I know. (I am also figuring out which fandoms I apparently asked for, as I couldn't for the life of me remember them.) I'm sure I'll end up writing one or two of them, just because they look so cool (I really want to write the A Separate Peace fic, but I have to wait to get my book back for that. Also, I ought to finish up the Blues Brothers fic I started the other day. Yes, I said Blues Brothers. Yes, it is slashy. Yes, I am sick and twisted.)

And now that it's a new year, I'm going to bed.

Okay, I really, *really* hope that I can either get inspired or at least motivated to write/finish a fic tonight and/or tomorrow, but just in case I don't, I present my New Year's fic from last year. Written New Year's Day night, after we had a brief, rare flurry of snow. FF7. Turks. Feel the WAFF.

( Read more... )

Happy New Year's Eve!

#1--Re-read stuff you've written before. The really old stuff. The "this is my very first fanfic ever so please be gentle" stuff.

Ouch.

It sucks mightily.

But I did find a few tidbits that still amuse me, so here they are (behind cut tags to protect those of you who prefer to read, oh, say, GOOD stuff)

( Musings on what the American releases of some series *might* have turned out like. You know, maybe Knight Hunters isn't quite so bad of a title after all. )

( A short, short, short GW fairy tale complete with beautiful princess, er, prince, er, whatever. )

( Things I Would Do If I Were an Anime Villain. Yes, yes, I know, boring and trite, and it's all been done a thousand times better in the Evil Overlord List. I still like numbers three and twenty, though. )

Yes, that's right, the results of my fic-exchange with Pyro are now available for your viewing pleasure here. Warning: PWP Squall/Irvine/Zell. Yes, that's right, threesome smut. You have been warned.

Tell me why I keep getting random, going-nowhere FF8 scenes. *points at Irvine* It's all his fault. *grumble*

It was cold in the tent. More than cold, it was freezing. Fuck, how did people manage to live here before electricity and heaters and better insulation than just a thin layer of cloth between themselves and the howling winds? Irvine glanced over to where Squall lay burrowed inside his bedroll. He was asleep, only the top of his head visible above the blue, standard-issue SeeD sleeping bag. Irvine sighed, and rummaged down deeper inside his own. These things must have been designed for midgets, he decided. He tried to curl up as best he could. Skinny midgets, he amended. Skinny midgets who enjoyed freezing to death. He glanced over at the third, empty bedroll. Maybe Zell wouldn’t mind if he borrowed it. Just for a little while, so he could fall asleep and stop shivering his ass off. He’d give it back when Zell came in from watch duty. Honest.

It took a little while to stop shivering and warm up the double layer of blankets, but finally he was able to relax and drift off into sleep. Irvine awoke slowly. It still wasn’t exactly stifling under the blankets, but the winds had died down outside and weak winter sunlight was peeking through the tent flaps. He could hear the faint jingle of Squall’s belts as he walked around the camp. There was a large lump in the middle of Squall’s discarded sleeping bag that presumably was Zell. He must have grabbed Squall’s bag when they switched out for camp watch last night, letting Irvine keep the extra cover. It was the sort of thing Irvine could easily see him doing.

He worked a couple of kinks from his neck and reluctantly eased out of the bag into the frigid morning air. Last night had been too cold for him to shed any clothing, so he only had to slip on his boots and grab his hat. Irvine picked up the topmost blanket, wrapped it around his shoulders, and stepped towards the tent flap. Then he paused, considering, and reached back to grab the other bedroll. He carefully settled it atop Zell’s hidden, huddled form. “Thanks,” he whispered, smiling down at the lump in the sleeping bag.