brainofck

I cannot ever remember being so happy with a story as I was writing it, as I was with Inland Sea. Usually, I think the whole thing is crap, and only after I come back to it after a couple of days to read it again, I think, huh, OK, this isn't bad.

A few notes.

On the Western Interior Seaway

I wanted to recreate the Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway. I obviously wasn't thinking at all. My plan was to melt the polar ice caps, but when I went to research what would be covered by polar melting, I realized that DUH, polar melting would NOT create North American inland sea. Further research revealed that OF COURSE, the Cretaceous sea was an artifact of the creation of North America as a continent and the uplift of the Rocky Mountains.

Well.

We will not be letting a little scientific fact interfere with the world I wanted to build. So there. I used this map as a guide as I was writing the story.



On the timeline screw-up

I came up with the idea of the crossover component of the story without thinking clearly about the Atlantis timeline. I realized only belatedly that the events in which I portray Atlantis participating actually occur BEFORE the Atlantis mission even left Earth. I basically folded the Atlantis timeline to start about two year earlier than it does in canon.

Well.

This is an AU already, starting with the Anubis story arc, so I figure it is only a minor quibble. I acknowledge it, and I move on.

On the fact that this is probably completely self indulgent pap

Well.

Face it, it is! However, I love it anyway. So. :p

Well.

What a weird 5 weeks or so it has been. ( Cut for blah blah blah about writing. )

Oh. My. God.

So, my massive, 20k story (give or take a couple of k), is totally based around MY INCORRECT MEMORY OF THE ATLANTIS TIMELINE.

Bite me, GateVerse. *glares*

Well, the whole thing is a massive AU. I'll include a note about it at the beginning and you can all suck it up and enjoy the story.

:p

I keep finding that this hydropunk thing needs more. More here. More there. And extra scene that I forgot about.

And more than once, in this NaNo season, I have wondered if I should actually make an effort to turn this into my first novel. Obviously, a fandom novel, but I believe the longest thing I have ever done is Arena, which came in about 30k, if memory serves.

Of course, I'm still only up to approximately 15,000 words on the hydropunk piece. But I'm still editing and not even up to the point in the edit where I was hoping to offload onto lokei at the end of the weekend, and I still have probably another 1000 words to add to that section alone. And for perspective, that will result in probably 2000 words being added to the first 6 manuscript pages just with the first cut edit. So. If I keep that up, with a 39 page manuscript, I could almost double the word count just from the editing, putting this around the length of Arena without even really *trying.*

What if I thought about it more, and developed the plot a little, and pushed for 50k?

It's an intriguing thought. I will continue to think about it.

"Dallas? Dallas..." Jack pretended to search his memory. "Twinkie guy, blond hair, great boots, cute accent? He was a damned good lay. I don't need genetically enhanced memory to remember him. And neither do you, if memory still serves."

I am inordinately pleased with the hydropunk piece, even though I think it may be massively self-indulgent. I hope it will at least be a guilty pleasure for a bunch of other people, too. Hit 12,000 words this morning. That's 12,000 words since October 22. Not bad. I'm thinking it may go over 15,000 now. Wonder if it'll go all the way to 20,000.

Meanwhile, I had an idea for a radical, sort of 25-steps-to-the-left AU. Not sure if I will write it or not. Could be quite grim. Also, fear it would be derivitive of that SB/VM thing with the bookstore and the homeless guy (Gah, can't believe I can't remember the name. It'll come to me. Wasn't in any of my old SB/VM recs, either, though I know at least once I crowed when it updated. Dang it.), but hopefully not, as the characters are radically different. It's not a very me story though. Maybe it can be something short.

On Friday, Boss's calendar has an item: "Metro from AU."

After a double take, I realized AU is NOT alternate universe, but, in fact American University.

*eyes calendar*

Dolphin sex
Western Interior Seaway: geography, geology
Cretaceous sea life
Find atlas to review basic American political geography (i.e. CK can't remember the cities of the midwest)
What were the names of the two religions based on the teachings of the prophet Bart?

OK, friends page, I'm counting on you for that last one. You saw the ep. You know it by heart. Two armies faced off over a religious war about the teachings of Bart. It was the same episode where Bart reminds the Catholics and the Protestants that they need to unite against their true enemies, monogamous gays and stem cells.

Ha! Wait! I found it! No. Damn. But now I know the episode. The Father, The Son, and The Holy Guest Star. Perhaps will break out the DVD tonight.

For the 2009 J/D Ficathon this year I got prehistoric_sea, who prompted as follows:

Two (2) Requirements:
1. porn
2. emotional complexity
Optional Request: two options:
1) It’s a trope of early SG-1 slash that Daniel is locked in the closet (often by Jack), barefoot, and weeping. Write an intelligent, contemporary take on this trope. Something real, if not realistic, fresh if not new.
2) Daniel assumed Jack knew he was transgender (FtM)--wouldn't something like that be in his file? Now that they've had a disastrous, mutually humiliating hook-up, can they put it behind them and have the relationship they both want--because the attraction isn't going anywhere.
Restriction #1: character-bashing
Restriction #2: too-perfect sex

Well, I've sort of done optional request 1 before: Possession.

So.

The second optional request. Hmmmmm. Strangely FTM Daniel started speaking to me. So.




Title: Not a Public Service Announcement
Author: muck_a_luck, posting in brainofck
Pairing: Daniel Jackson/Jack O'Neill
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Daniel is out. Jack is not. And yet Daniel still has a secret.
Content/warnings: Trangender issues, with attempted treatment by a straight woman who has never had a transgender thought in her life. Hopefully, I pulled off something remotely real and readable.
Words: 3,715
Written for: prehistoric_sea
Disclaimer: If anybody is planning a script like this for SG-1, I'm certainly not going to claim any rights to it. However, I'd be delighted to work in a co-writing/consulting/first-reader/advisory-type capacity, with my fee to be negotiated at that time. :D
Archive rights: Absolutely none. My journals only. muck_a_luck and brainofck

Beta: Many thanks to melayneseahawk for her quick beta and encouragement to revisit certain issues.




( Not a Public Service Announcement )