Trabia Garden

When I have a fic idea, I’ll usually scribble it down in the back of my diary. It’s time to switch diaries again, so I’m going to carry on the tradition I started last year!

This post lists all the fic ideas at the back of my 2022-23 diary. If I’ve written the fic, I’ll include a link to it. If I’ve started the fic, I’ll share a snippet. If I haven’t started it, I’ll write at least a hundred words on the spot.

First of all, here are the fics I’ve written in full. Fandoms: The Book of Mormon, Life Is Strange, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Do Revenge, Person of Interest, Lost, The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( Written fics from my 2022-23 diary. )


Next, let’s look at the works in progress (or at least the works that were started; I’m not sure they’re actively progressing). Fandoms: The X-Files, Silent Hill, Hypnospace Outlaw, Final Fantasy VIII, Lost, Animorphs. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( In-progress fics from my 2022-23 diary. )


Finally, it’s time for the fic ideas I haven’t touched and now have to write something for. I’m a little intimidated by this category, but let’s see how it goes.

Fandoms: The Book of Mormon, The X-Files, Beacon Pines, Person of Interest, Community, Lost, Scrubs, Silent Hill. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( 2022-23 fics I hadn't started... until now. )


I’m glad I started doing this! Most of these will probably never become full fics, but it’s good to at least make a start on these concepts, rather than letting them languish eternally in my old diaries.

I'm rewatching How to Get Away with Murder, and I like the characters more than I remembered! What a great bunch of murder kids.


( Notes on the first season of How to Get Away with Murder, up to episode nine. )


I might just rewatch the first season, because the main appeal (for me, at least) is 'normal kids trying to cope with insane bullshit they absolutely cannot handle'. New insane bullshit comes along in later seasons (or at least in season two; I don't think I've seen beyond that), but once the characters are old hands at insane bullshit it's not as fun.

That said, I seem to recall the kids discussing the possibility of having an orgy in season two; I'd be sorry to miss that conversation! Maybe I'll watch up to that point and see if I'm still engaged enough to carry on.

(There is a shocking lack of foursome fanfiction for these characters who committed a murder together and then canonically talked about having an orgy. There are four works on AO3 tagged with Wes/Laurel/Connor/Michaela! Four! Out of over two thousand for the fandom as a whole! Absolutely unacceptable.)

Finished NEO: The World Ends with You! Here are my notes up to the end.


( Spoilers up to the end of NEO: The World Ends with You. )


Final verdict: this game was sort of a mess, but an enjoyable mess! Which is what I tend to expect from Square in general and Nomura in particular, really. I'm satisfied.

I've just realised that Animorphs technically qualifies as one of my major fandoms, by my 'at least ten thousand words across at least three fics' measure. This slightly feels like cheating, because I've only written one fic (my Animorphs/Hunger Games fic) that's actually about the Animorphs, and my other three Animorphs fics are fusions that don't include the Animorphs characters. But I'm going to do a 'my fandom history' writeup for it anyway. It's been very influential for me, after all.


Animorphs

Animorphs was the first work of fiction I ever got really, passionately into, around the age of nine, and it would probably have been my first fandom if I'd had Internet access when I first started reading the books (I started using the Internet when I was around eleven).

I was aware of the Animorphs series before I started reading it, but I didn't have any real interest in it. Somehow, though, I got my hands on a book of book previews - like a demo disc, but with snippets of children's books instead of game demos - and it contained an extract from the first Animorphs book; I believe it was the scene in which Jake turns into a lizard and, unable to control his newfound animal instincts, eats a live spider. Apparently this caught my attention! I got the first book out of the library, I suspect, and that was it; I fell hard into the series and started checking out ten books at a time, which I think was the maximum number the library would allow.

Even though I didn't write fanfiction about the characters until this year, Animorphs has been a presence in my writing from the start; my writing style in my early Pokémon fanfiction, at the age of twelve, was heavily and noticeably influenced by Animorphs. And that early style is what my current style grew out of, so my writing would probably look completely different if I'd never read this series.

Animorphs is also to blame for much of my dark taste in fiction. My love of guilt-ridden characters making horrible choices in impossible situations? My increasingly worrying collection of media about teenagers undergoing traumatic experiences? It all comes back to these horrifying, brilliant books I read in primary school.

Ginger linked me to this condensed version of every Animorphs book yesterday, and I shrieked with laughter. I sobbed with laughter. It's the most perfectly accurate thing I've ever seen.

Favourite character: It's between Marco (sarcastic, cynical little shit) and Rachel (fashionable, feminine and incredibly bloodthirsty). Rachel was my favourite when I was a kid, but in rereading the books as an adult I've developed a new appreciation for Marco.
Favourite pairing: I've never really done much shipping in Animorphs, but I've always had a small soft spot for Marco/Jake. My favourite character dynamic is Marco and Rachel; I love the way they're constantly sniping at each other.
Number of words written: 23,083

I usually include an unposted snippet of fanfiction in 'my fandom history' writeups, but I don't have any Animorphs snippets to offer, alas!

Previously on Old Fanfiction Book Club: after eight chapters of absolutely no plot, Rachel suddenly develops a psychic connection with a Team Rocket member who can travel between universes, a concept that is dropped as quickly as it appears.

The original author's note for chapter eleven: WARNING: From this chapter onwards, viewpoints will be changing. I advise you read whose viewpoint it is to avoid becoming confused. This chapter introduces a completely random person called Monica -_-'


( Rachel's Pokémon Journey, Chapter Eleven, with annotations. )


The original author's note for chapter twelve: ACK! Sorry for not updating yesterday!

I was gonna switch back to Rachel and leave the cliffhanger hanging there, but then I figured I’d get lynched.


( Rachel's Pokémon Journey, Chapter Twelve, with annotations. )


In the next instalment of Old Fanfiction Book Club: I attempt to go back to writing about a normal Pokémon journey, which is a bit disconcerting after all this ridiculous plot.

Previously on Old Fanfiction Book Club: Riona Rachel and Danielle were assigned their starter Pokémon and rivals without any personal input, because apparently twelve-year-old Riona was determined to remove any element of choice from the Pokémon universe. I've always been terrible at making decisions, so perhaps my escapist fantasy was a world where I wouldn't have to make any.


( Rachel's Pokémon Journey, Chapter Three, with annotations. )


My original author's note on the fourth chapter was '((I'll only add more chapters if people review! There's no point if people won't read it!))'. I'm pretty sure I posted chapters one to four to fanfiction.net simultaneously, so it was slightly ridiculous for me to become impatient. HOW DARE YOU NOT REVIEW MY FIC THE SECOND I POST IT.


( Rachel's Pokémon Journey, Chapter Four, with annotations. )


In the next instalment of Old Fanfiction Book Club, Rachel and Danielle meet two characters who definitely aren't supposed to be my brothers, I swear, and Rachel actually succeeds in catching a Pokémon for once.

On Saturday, I attended a party at someone's house. There were some guests I knew, many I didn't; everyone was around the kitchen area. At one point I had to go up to the bathroom to change my sanitary towel, and then I realised there was no bin in the bathroom.

Who doesn't have a bin in their bathroom?

So I had to wrap up my used sanitary towel, put it in my bag and return to the party.

There was a bin in the kitchen. I eyed it longingly. But it was surrounded by PARTY GUESTS I DIDN'T KNOW, and I found myself reluctant to go up and throw a sanitary towel into the kitchen bin in front of a load of strangers. So I just stood there, paralysed by indecision, with this stupid thing still in my shoulder bag.

This may be the most Peep Show thing that has ever happened to me.

('What happened?' a friend of mine asked me, because it was apparently evident from my expression the moment I re-entered the party that all was not well. They were very amused by my hushed, desperate answer.)

In the end, I cunningly concealed it within a paper plate and threw that away. Nobody suspected a thing.


The Wind Singer, I discovered on my reread, is the origin of a scene that's haunted me since childhood. An infinite number of murderous teenagers are marching along, singing a cheerful song about killing. They want to murder people, but all of civilisation is on the other side of an enormous chasm. There is no bridge across the chasm. Their strategy for crossing is this: they march over the edge, and they fall, and they die, and eventually enough corpses will pile up at the bottom of the gorge for the next fallers to land safely on the corpse pile and walk across.

Did I read anything as a child that wasn't horrifying? I feel that this book and Animorphs probably had a big influence on my alarming taste in fiction.

The Wind Singer also gave me unhealthily codependent sibling protagonists long before I got into Supernatural. 'My brother's been brainwashed into being one of the murderous teenagers! I could run, but I think I'd prefer to just let him murder me.'


I played a little more Transistor at last! I've forgiven Red's sword for secretly being a person trapped in a sword and I'm 'shipping him with Red again. Her sword admires her so much! It's really charming!

There's a lot of really nice detail in this game. And the visuals are so stylish. And the music is great.

I think my favourite part is when the sword is in a bad way, and Red can't speak to reassure him, so instead she finds a computer terminal and types messages to him.

I recently had a conversation with my housemate about how extremely screwed up the Animorphs books were, containing the line, 'Yeah, that's not the first genocide in the Animorphs books.' It reminded me that I once wrote an Animorphs-inspired short story for school, and my English teacher called my parents because she was worried about my psychological health. (Look, we were prompted to write about nightmares! Were you expecting something nice?)

Seriously, though. There's one book where a kid's parents have been enslaved by mind-controlling aliens, so he goes, 'Well, I'll just murder this terminally injured kid and morph into him and go "look, I've made a miraculous recovery!" and then I'll have his parents,' and our heroes end up trapping him permanently in the body of a rat on an isolated island, which gets a reputation for being haunted because passing sailors can hear the rat-kid's psychic screams. One of our heroes, in rat form, is forced to chew through her own tail so their horrible plan will work. I was maybe ten years old when I read this.

Wait, are the Animorphs books the origin of my fondness for the Teenagers Suffering Horribly genre? They're definitely the origin of my writing style; the influence is really, really obvious when I reread my early Pokémon fanfiction. I've kept the 'very straightforward prose, lots of dialogue' aspects to this day. (And, on a content note, I'm still writing about teenagers suffering horribly.)


The theme of the inevitable Linkin Park segment in this entry is 'songs Linkin Park inexplicably never released on an album and don't have on their official YouTube channel EVEN THOUGH THEY'RE GREAT', because I went on a desperate hunt after hearing 'No Roads Left'. I've never heard Mike sing like this before! He usually raps or sings more gently; I had no idea he could manage something this desperate. And 'Across the Line' (warning for suicidal themes) is easily polished enough to be an album song; the buildup of the instruments is great. (The cats just had a DRAMATIC BATTLE while I was listening to it, and it made for the most incredible background music.)

Moving to some softer songs, 'She Couldn't' (again, suicidal themes) is also very good, although at least I can see why this one never ended up on an album: it was recorded in the Hybrid Theory era and wouldn't have fit with the harder sound of their other songs at the time, and the sampling might have created legal issues. And I love the instrumentation and singing on Blackbirds, although the lyrics hurt.

(Hard to think of any song from this band where the lyrics don't hurt. I'm doing a little better now (writing that horrible Until Dawn timeloop fic was incredibly cathartic and helped me claw myself out of a bad psychological dip), but it's been a really tough month. Chester's death in many ways feels like the death of my childhood, and it also got tangled up in my head with the death of a friend of mine under similar circumstances years ago, so I've been grieving on a weird number of levels.

WAIT, CURSES, I GOT SAD IN AN ENTRY AGAIN AND THE RULES SAY I HAVE TO POST SOMETHING CUTE TO MAKE UP FOR IT. Here are Chester and Joe putting on a stupid puppet show with puppets of the band members. I love the 'making fun of friends you know really well' feel of it. I also enjoyed Chester bouncing around ridiculously to a silly version of 'One Step Closer'.)

I don't know why I've ended up writing such a huge entry on a game none of you have played, but, er, here you go. (The last few paragraphs of the entry still concern Until Dawn but may be of more general interest to people who play videogames.)


I ended up spoiling myself for just about everything in Until Dawn, because I was far too freaked out to keep watching when I didn't know what was going on, and it's amazing how much of a difference it made. Every QTE was terrifying when I was unspoiled; every decision felt like a matter of life or death. Once I'd looked things up, I was absolutely fine; I could just watch and enjoy this story about a group of flawed teenagers in a horrible situation without being constantly on the verge of dissolving into petrified sobs.

In a way, I do regret robbing myself of the opportunity to play the game blind, making my own bad decisions and seeing who survives to the end. On the other hand, even if a first playthrough is probably a powerful experience, I feel it wouldn't be an experience I'd enjoy.

It's really interesting to see the way the game's situation brings out certain qualities in its characters. Mike and Sam are at their absolute best when they and their friends are in mortal peril (even if Mike screws up sometimes). Emily very much looks out for herself, but she's able to stay focused and keep going. Ashley doesn't do well under pressure at all, although, to be fair, she's put in really horrifying situations. You might die! You might not! It's completely up to the person who's weighing your life against something else, and all you can do is wait helplessly!

I think an Animorphs AU for Until Dawn could work really well: it's a similar 'hey, teenagers, here's an awful situation you've suddenly been thrown into, you're going to have to think strategically to not die, good luck!' concept, and I'd love to see how the Until Dawn characters would handle it. Given that there are eight characters involved, though, it'd probably be too ambitious a project for me to attempt.

(Would Mike be the leader? Sam? Maybe Mike's the leader in name and Sam's actually the one who keeps things together.)

I don't think I'll be writing any more Until Dawn fanfiction, although admittedly I thought that after my first Until Dawn fic, and indeed after my second. But I've written 'Mike and Sam are miserable and make out', 'Mike and Sam are miserable and don't make out' and 'Mike wants to make out with everyone (and is miserable)'. Where else can I go? I can't just write endlessly about Mike being miserable, but it's the only thing my heart is interested in.

(I got a review on my Mike/everyone fic that said 'THIS WAS SADDER THAN I THOUGHT IT WAS GONNA BE. ;A;', which I'm pleased with because it is exactly according to my evil plan. The summary is 'Mike Munroe has a lot of attractive friends, and he'd make out with all of them if he could.' Hey, this'll be silly and fun! NO. NO FUN. MISERY. IT'S UNTIL DAWN.)

If I could write sex, I'd probably write a fic where Mike and Sam are the only ones left alive, they're still trapped on the mountain, and they end up banging unhappily because they're probably going to die anyway and it's the only thing they can think of to do. Alas, it's not in my skillset.


I've been skipping around and watching bits of a lot of different Until Dawn Let's Plays, and not just because I could watch Mike cut his own fingers off all day. I really like watching people slowly warm to Mike. He makes such a bad first impression (the first two things he does are 'participate in a cruel prank' and 'jumpscare you'), and I love the way a lot of players gradually progress from 'who's this arsehole?' to 'actually, I'm really invested in this arsehole's survival.'

Something I found interesting: at one point, when ChristopherOdd was playing as Mike, Jessica called to Mike for help. ChristopherOdd commented on 'the sheer terror in her voice, calling out our name'. When you play as Mike, does Mike's name become your name as well? Referring to playable characters in the first person is common enough; if Nathan Drake falls off a cliff when I'm controlling him, I'll usually say that I fell, rather than that Nate fell. Referring to yourself and the playable character together as 'us' isn't unheard of; you might say, 'Come on, Mike, let's see what's over here' (I'd never say 'we fell off a cliff' in the Uncharted example, though). But thinking of the name of the character you're playing as 'your' name strikes me as unusual.

Then again, if you saw me playing Silent Hill 2 and asked what was happening in it, I feel I might say that I'm looking for my wife. I don't know why names are specifically the point at which I feel a barrier falls between me and the playable character.

Are there any studies on when people refer to playable characters in the first person? Does it happen more with customisable protagonists, with silent protagonists, with protagonists that share the player's gender? Does having more than one playable character in the game affect it? (I feel I don't generally use 'I' in Final Fantasy games, for example, where you can usually control the actions of multiple characters.) Does whether the player likes the protagonist affect it? It's a difficult subject to Google, unfortunately. I don't want to know about first-person videogames; I want to know about people talking about videogames in the first person!

I was a little worried about writing a Last of Us AU with no apocalypse; is it possible to make Ellie and Riley feel right in a pre-apocalypse setting? Well, I seem to have written this anyway, so I suppose the answer will have to be 'I certainly hope so!'

I don't know if I'll write any more in this universe, but there are definitely more stories to explore here.


Title: Extreme Team-Building Exercises
Fandom: The Last of Us
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: slight Ellie/Riley
Wordcount: 7,500
Summary: My name's Ellie. The girls turning into flies are Riley and Sarah. And we are fighting a war that's way too big for us. (Animorphs AU)


( Extreme Team-Building Exercises )