Definitely fallen in too deep

First and foremost, our Cap Big Bang fic Everything Rekindled is now completely posted. The art by auntiesuze is embedded in it, all five pieces plus the banner are just so beautiful! I got extremely lucky with this collaboration.

Now that the bang fic is off the table, I'll work on other stuff. It was funny, since I've lately been generally busy so that I've only managed to work on the bang fic, and it was all editing in the final weeks, it was a bit of a drag to get back to actually writing. I did manage some, though. Some of the things I'll be working on in the near future (plus a new idea) below.

I wrote another chapter for my holiday space adventure, and at this point I'm really glad I decided to go with a less ambitious plan this year, since there's two thirds still to go. At this point I don't think I'll have a terrible rush to finish it, but I'll have the whole Christmas week off work, so that'll help if it comes to it.

Beyond that, I want to write the Carol/Maria story that I've already started, and I actually set up a scrivener file for the quartet series I mentioned last month, the post-EG sort of fix-it where the parts focus on Sam, Nat, Steve and Bucky in the aftermath. The first part will be about Sam.

Also a non-Marvel thing, I think I've mentioned I love the comic the Wicked + the Divine, which ended this summer. I always played with the idea of writing a story of Inanna and Baal, and I'm going to, a small one at least.

And the new idea, which was a suspected brain hijacking, because it's a contemporary no powers AU, and that's really not something that usually happens to me. I've sometimes entertained the idea, but I like even in my AUs to have some parallels with canon, and I really didn't want to do a war veteran story, because all things considered, I think Steve would be against every recent war the US has been involved with. But I came up with a premise that worked for me, so maybe that will get written.

I say maybe, because at this point I really have to accept all my ideas will not get written, even some fics that have a serious word count in drafts will never see the light of day. That's just how it goes.

It's been a busy couple of weeks, and since I've had limited time, I've only worked on editing the Cap BB fic. Hence no post last weekend, because there isn't too much to say.

There is a thing to show you, though: here's a teaser for the art on twitter, by auntiesuze. I'm super delighted how they've turned out, and can't wait for you guys to see them.

We'll start posting next weekend, a new chapter daily until Nov 10th.

I skipped a couple of Sundays, because there's only a limited amount of time, and writing these tidbits wasn't a very painful thing to give up. I've been fairly busy, especially this week (up until Friday I hadn't had any free time for myself which was definitely taxing), not to mention Septembers are just chronically difficult. At least there wasn't terrible seasonal insomnia this year, so I guess I should count my blessings.

Anyway, two Sundays ago it was either write one of these or finish a fic, and I chose the latter. Our Destinies Intertwined is my contribution to Cap Septender, the happier war era fic as I called it.It also gained a small coda of art geekery, of all things :D

Other than that, I've been editing my Cap BB fic, which is coming along well. Also, since it's no longer necessary to keep everything secret, I can let you know it's called Everything Rekindled, and it's set in 2012-13 where Bucky freed himself in the early eighties already, and is very much settled into his life when Steve is found. It's not that simple to reconnect, though. Our posting date is on November 10th, but it's in chapters, and the first will (unless something unexpected happens) be posted the previous Sunday, the 3rd.

I also wrote another chapter for the holiday space adventure, and started a new story which is about Carol and Maria (I should maybe investigate what the shipname is), set a year after Captain Marvel. I've been mulling over it a long time now, but finally started writing it. It won't be very long, and I'm kind of hoping to post it this month.

I also got an idea for a series where each part would focus on a different character, Sam, Nat, Steve, and Bucky. It would be post Endgame-ish, but definitely in the fix-it category (as one might guess from the fact Nat is around).

This week was looking relatively productive until I was on Netflix yesterday afternoon, noticed the Losers was back in rotation, and decided to watch it. Since then I've read a truly astounding amount of fic, so today has definitely not been productive. I'd seen the movie before, but it had never demanded me to read fic before, so this was very unexpected. I had read one series previously, by a writer whose other works I'd liked, but hadn't been left craving for more until now. Oh well. I also know what story I would write if it came to that, but not sure if I'll get to it. For now it's not demanding to get away from my head.

Actual writing things that I did this week:

I managed a good bit of the happier war era story that's meant for Cap Septender. It's very squarely in the fluff and smut category, and the length should be manageable considering I got them into the bathtub in less than 2k :D

I also started editing my Cap BB fic. There are no dramatic revisions needed, which is always nice, just plenty of smoothing of the rough edges.

This week was not very productive at all, partly because a lot of my time was spent watching orienteering world championships (I used to do orienteering until my knees decided at around 20 that running was not for me. These days I'm happy that it's become a pretty good tv sport with GPS and smaller cameras). There was also mysterious lack of energy last couple of days until today when I realized it was just PMS :D

Anyway, I continued with the fic set during war time, and while there weren't that many new words, I think what I did write was pretty good stuff, so there's that.

I was also thinking of writing something set in that era for the Cap Septender, the one I'm in the middle of is very much about conflict and all the worry of that time, and it would be nice to write a moment when they're just happy for a moment. Maybe set around the liberation of Paris or something.

I also now have a possible idea of what will be the twelve day holiday fic at the end of this year. I haven't fully committed yet, but it feels suitable. It's a bit different from the previous ones, they've been fairly plotty and always had conflicts of some kind, while this one will most likely consist of vignettes that are connected but not necessarily relying on each other too much, and they'll be (at least mostly) happy. Last year I wrote a future fic set in space, The Open Road Still Softly Calls, and this would be something similar, future Steve and Bucky traveling in space, centered on their daily lives. I like the first story, and have felt there's more potential. I also recently read Becky Chambers' delightful The Long Road to a Small Angry Planet, which got me thinking of it again.

My Cap big bang fic is nearly written, there's a bit of the main narrative left and a short epilogue, and then it's done. Well, obviously after that it'll need a truckload of editing and betaing, but the story will be on (digital) paper.

Now that the second round of claims is done and we can talk about the stories, here's the gist very shortly: it's set in 2012, Bucky escaped Hydra already in the eighties and has established himself contently in Brooklyn. His life gets more exciting with Steve being found, because it means they will have to work out what their relationship will be like now, which isn't so easy because in addition to the decades apart, it wasn't exactly simple back before either.

Fun thing with this story is that I've been thinking about it on and off ever since 2015 (-ish, I think), but it came to the top of the pile as the most urgent thing to write only now. I had already last year thought this might be a good candidate for the bang, but the final decision was made this spring.

Other than this, I've also decided what I'll write next. I mentioned having thought up a scene set during the war time, and this week I've been fleshing out the story for it in my head. It feels like a pretty well contained one shot, which would be a nice change of pace for a bit, since I've been writing longer stories for all this year.

I've been working mostly on the Cap big bang fic this week, I've done both writing and some initial editing to the earlier chapters so that they'll be readable for my artist right after claims. The proper editing will be done later when the whole thing is written, but I'm fixing the obvious issues I've noticed as I've written forward.

I also got to a key part that I'd been eager to write this week, but when I was actually writing it, it went so slowly at first, and then final thousand words and change I just blasted through yesterday. The good feeling carried on to today, I managed a whole scene of about a thousand words in less than an hour this morning before I had to get things ready for hanging out with my sister. The total length seems to have stabilized now somewhere around 40k, it hasn't kept on ballooning, which is great. Of course this might change with the final few chapters that are yet to be written.

I've also worked a bit on my post-Endgame thing, and I'm just here writing it based on my liberal interpretation of the movie and the spaces it left for us to fill in. I don't care at all what the MCU people say about how we should interpret any of it, and I'm sure I'm much happier as is, considering how people react whenever there's a presser. I haven't read a single interview or suchlike about the movie, and I'm not intending to either.

Let's look at some numbers, shall we.

I have a document where I list all my fics that are either WIPs or just ideas. If I think of a very broad concept I don't put it on the list yet, but if there's a particular perspective or hook, it goes there. For example, there's no "something post-EG" entry, but "post-EG with this specific starting point and conflict" is there. Right now, the total number of fics on the list is 24. It's very likely not all of these end up written, because there are always new ones that at the moment feel more urgent, and if I get an idea when I'm very intensely writing something else, it might get shuffled to the bottom pile and as time passes feel less and less relevant. There are several ideas/WIP that came up during the writing of These Are My Hands, that will possibly stay as they are indefinitely.

Of those 24, four are currently on the top of my mind, and two are actual WIPs. The one I'm more intensely working on right now is the Cap BB fic. It's coming along pretty well, although (unsurprisingly) the projected word count seems to be going up. Three of nine chapters are written, and I've got 14k words, so it looks closer to 40k total than the 35 I guessed last week. I wrote a particularly tricky scene yesterday and it came out pretty well I think, so I'm happy.

The submissions for claims are on the 15th, which means I'm going to have to think of a title for it, and as usual I have no ideas at all. I'm easily past the required word count for this point, and the scene I want to submit for claims is selected, so clearly there needed to be one thing to struggle with. I know it can be a working title, but I'd prefer to have it at least close to final one. I'll keep my focus on this story over the next week as well, I want to have it as close to finished by the claims as possible.

The other story that I've been writing is the post-Endgame thing. Recently I've been focusing on it less, but it's coming along, and once my vacation starts week from now I'll start editing along with the writing so that I can start posting.

The last two on the top of my head are still on the idea level, but they're cooking, new details keep coming up, and the point when I can start writing is nearing. One of them is a war time story, and the other one has an ace-Steve, which is something I've been mulling over for a while now. I might start writing one of these during my vacation, or during the fall at latest.

Another thing I should start considering, since we're at the second half of the year; what will the end of year holiday fic be?

I've got three weeks until my summer vacation and I'm about ready to start now. At least the last few weeks should be less hectic than the previous few.

With writing it was an okay week in general. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it in these posts (it's mentioned on my dw profile) that I also volunteer as a translator for OTW, which means in general I've got less time for writing, since there are only so many hours in the day and week. For the last sevenish months since i started volunteering the OTW time has mostly come from my writing time. It's not a one on one exchange, because there are times when creative writing isn't happening because ugh, but translating etc. is still possible. Anyway, I'm still expecting to write somewhat less than over the previous couple of years, but it's a choice I'm happy with, I like the volunteer work and the community. Recently it's been busy with all the elections content, so I've been prioritizing that somewhat, but I've still managed to write more fic than in winter when I clearly had the fallow season going on.

Anyway, to the stories. I've worked on the Endgame thing, the first chapter is written (but not edited, I've decided to start posting it later and not tomorrow like I speculated I might). I also added some more notes for the upcoming chapters.

I also worked on the Cap BB fic. I'm now starting to lean toward posting it in chapters, but it's not given yet. Second chapter is halfway done, and I should maybe work on the plot outline a bit more because I have the vague "aim here" sense of it, but no real structure yet, and I'm getting to the part where I'm starting to need that.

And my brain cooked up another idea, but happily it didn't end up as a new entry on my idea list, because it fit together with a previous one very nicely. The old one was an angle for a character, this new one is a plot that creates a nice bit of conflict for that particular characterization, so it worked out for me.

We had a heatwave, which definitely did affect my productivity, because I didn't sleep as well as usual, but I'm still pretty happy with what I managed. It seems to be cooling at least a bit again, which I'm definitely looking forward to. Anyway, this week was about the bangs:

Our Cap Reverse Big Bang collaboration was posted yesterday, you can find it here: The Irrefutable Constant of Our Lives.

And since one bang was done and dusted, I did sign up for the regular order Cap Big Bang. I had thought of waiting a bit, but decided I might just forget so better do it directly :D Besides, I'm nearly past the claims requirement of five thousand words already after a week of writing, so it's coming along very well. All the writing this week was for that story. I'm not yet sure if it'll be posted all at once or in chapters, but if it'll be in chapters the first one is written. I'm not sure exactly how long it'll be, I've drafted the beginning, but the rest of it is fairly vague still. It's not going to be a monster, I wouldn't sing up to a bang with something like that, but it'll certainly easily go past the required 15k.

Next week I'll continue with this, and might also start writing the Endgame related thing. I had a sort of mental hurdle that I was wrestling with when it came to it, I had scene ideas but wasn't sure what the focus should be. I did clear that, though, and now I can start writing it.