Charles vs Erik- The Same Old Arguement

Professor X and Magneto. The two sides of the same coin, the comic world version of Dr. King and Malcolm X.

You think you are right?
Can you not see?
We need to work with them not against them.
Are we truly that different from them?

You think you are right?
Will you not see?
They would us die rather than live with them.
We are different enough.

What you speak of
How is it different from what They did?
Do you wish to be like them?

What you hint at,
It is become like They were.
Or once again become like we were.

They will learn.
Give them the chance to.
They have accepted others in the past.

They have never learned.
Too many chances already.
Accepted, or merely tolerated?

They fear us.

As well they should.

I wish for peace.

As do I.

We can have it with them.

No, we cannot.

Shared-A Buffy/Angel songfic

So there was no tweet worth talking about for Tuesday, which worked cause I wanted to post an old fic of mine. It is missing my usual sex, but there is violence so we will rate this Mature. And you will see why my nom de plume is DarkenHeart. The song is ‘Bother’ by Stone Sour.

Shared

His gaze fell around the stone room. His home. There hadn’t been much. Now there wasn’t even that. He listlessly walked about, kicking at things. His foot connected with the radio, jarring it into life. He gave a passing thought to flicking it off. He shrugged. Who cares? The tears started down his face. yeah, who cares?

Wish I was too dead to cry
My self-affliction fades
Stones to throw at my creator
Masochists to which I cater

She tossed and turned in her bed. She had known something was wrong when she came home. But as usual no one was telling her anything. A face flashed in her mind. No, it couldn’t be him.

You don’t need to bother;
I don’t need to be
I’ll keep slipping farther
But once I hold on,
I won’t let go ’til it bleeds

The apartment was suddenly too large and empty. It hadn’t always felt that way. But he had driven out the only thing that made it feel like a home. He had messed up as usual. He was nothing if not dependable in that respect. His hand reached for the radio. Trying to force the quiet back.

Wish I was too dead to care
If indeed I cared at all
Never had a voice to protest
So you fed me shit to digest
I wish I had a reason;
my flaws are open season
For this, I gave up trying
One good turn deserves my dying

She stared out the window. What was supposed to be a joyous day had fell to ruin. This town wouldn’t let them be happy. No, it wouldn’t let him be happy.

You don’t need to bother;
I don’t need to be
I’ll keep slipping farther
But once I hold on,
I won’t let go ’til it bleeds

The radio next door drove home how thin the walls were. Home. He had taken home away from the one person who needed it the most. The one person of them all who deserved it. It was true what they said about Good Intentions.

Wish I’d died instead of lived
A zombie hides my face
Shell forgotten
with its memories
Diaries left
with cryptic entries

Her hand faltered in its writing. Her family was falling apart and she didn’t know how to stop it. If only they could see. Others were to blame. But their hatred was reserved for him.

And you don’t need to bother;

Wood beckoned.

I don’t need to be

Metal beckoned.

I’ll keep slipping farther

Glass beckoned.

But once I hold on,
I won’t let go ’til it bleeds

Song Shared.

Three young women were suddenly startled out of their thoughts and sleep. Something had hold of their hearts, squeezing them tight. They had to go. Had to stop him.

Hardly knowing how they found themselves where they needed to be, each threw herself against the door and toward the solitary figure inside.

Stopped the Stake.
She held him as he cried for the love denied him.

Stopped the Bullet.
She held him as he cried for the love he had driven away.

Stopped the Needle.
She held him as he cried for the love he had lost.

In a right world, that’s how it would have been. But then, none of them knew a right world.

Dream Shared.

You don’t need to bother;

NO!
Dawn jumped down the ladder, her hand reaching for Spike as the stake pierced his heart.

I don’t need to be

NO!
Willow tore down the bedroom door, her hand reaching for Xander as the bullet tore thru his brain.

I’ll keep slipping farther

NO!
Fred unlocked the door and flew into the room, her hand reaching for Wesley as the needle sent the poison into his veins.

But once I hold on…
I’ll never live down my deceit

Reality Shared.

FanFiction and me

And we start at the beginning.

I write fanfiction and have for maybe the last eight years or so. It is a much decried genre and not quite on this side of being legal.

There are those who say we’re not true writers since we are taking another writer’s universe and not creating our own. I will say on one hand that is true. We did none of the hard work to come up with the characters or their world. But on the other (albeit smaller) hand it takes a bit of skill to remain true to the voices of the characters while putting them in foreign situations. There’s enough bad fic out there to prove this point.

There are three main sub-genres of fanfiction: Gen, Het, and Slash.

Gen (general) is when you stick to the canon of whichever book, show or movie you are writing about and usually take it one of two ways.

1.) You show the alternative ala Marvel Comics’ What If…? title where a defining event does not occur as originally given (the first issue, What If Gwen Stacy Hadn’t Died? from the Spiderman universe, being a prime example).

2.) You expand the universe past what the creator(s) themselves set out. The Dune, Star Trek and Star Wars books are the sanctioned examples of this.

In either case, you maintain the status quo.

Het (heterosexual) takes a male and a female character who are either not in a relationship and brings them together or deepens the one given by the source material. That couple you know is never going to get together but everyone wants them to. The best friends who need to become lovers already.

Slash echoes the intent of het, but in this case it involves a same-sex coupling. The name comes from the early days of the genre where friend pairings were listed using an ampersand (&) and involved pairings were shown with a slash (/). Slash is mainly used with regards to male pairings, Femslash is used for female.

There are gen and het archives that will not accept slash fic. The owners are very hostile to it and do not want it anywhere near them. As a writer of slash, I am ever amused by this fact. I suppose I can see their point, but I still chuckle whenever I come across their little fortresses against me and those of my ilk.

Another hot topic is the use of celebrities in fics as opposed to the characters they play. Slashers who do it get a bit more heat than writers in the other two categories, but it is a frowned upon thing in general. Real person is what I have been concentrating on as of late.

When it comes to authors whose work is being used by fanficcers, there are three camps. The first, which includes Anne Rice and George Lucas, do not like it in the slightest and their lawyers have the cease-and-desist forms at the ready.

The second group knows about fanfic, realize it’s out there but don’t want to hear or read about it regarding their works. Charles Stross is one such author.

But it might surprise you to know that the third group not only knows about us, but does encourage us. Chief among them in my experience is Joss Whedon. Joss makes no bones about knowing we’re out here and has thrown us many a bone over the years. In fact, at a 2004 convention of fanfic writers in Las Vegas the guest of honor was Jane Espenson, one of his staff writers and a show producer.

He has even given his name to fanfic terminology. To be Jossed is to have the vague canon reference you used in your fic made concrete in a way that negates what you wrote. An example would be a fic that has Angel as an only child before the flashback episode that speaks of his killing his younger sister.

And he has given slashers more than one doff of the cap. From Spike’s “I’m his date” needling of Angel in front of someone to Angel’s “I’ve got no problem spanking men” threat to one of the bad guys.

I’m proud to be a fanficcer and do not have plans to leave the genre completely as I work on creating original fiction. It’s straight up a part of who I am and what I enjoy. I would never try to gain financially from it nor would I ever have the bad taste to show it to the actors or writers.

At the end of the day, I’m not standing in defense of fanfiction as much as just standing up and being numbered among those who write it.