#GEN. EVELYN / SOLE SURVIVOR.

[vault-heck]

AO3 First Lines

I was tagged by @sleeplessincarcosa - thanks, and sorry it took me ages to get to this! life has been wild

rules: post the first lines of your last 10 fics posted to ao3. if you have less than 10 fics posted, post the first lines of all your fics.

Evelyn had made the right decision to put Curie in charge of the Vault 88 experiments.

from Her Hypothesis (Sole Survivor x Curie, explicit one shot)

The C.I.T. ruins should have been quiet, in fact, they should have been silent, abandoned for as long as any of its neighbors could remember.e.

from The Birds Work for the Bourgeoisie (OC Omen, Gen, mature, WIP)

Adhesive met bronze underneath Noah’s thumbs as he pressed a wide white band of cloth over the statue at the entrance of Sanctuary Hills.

from For Glad and Golden Hours (Sole Survivor x Preston Garvey, teen+ one shot)

“Find ‘em and kill ‘em!” someone screamed.

from Wildfire (Sole Survivor x Preston Garvey, explicit long fic)

To Nora’s surprise, the surface teemed with growth.

from Hardly a Man in Uniform (Sole Survivor x Preston Garvey, explicit, WIP -- Wildfire re-write)

I will tag: @x-sapphicpirate-x, @wishing4nuclearwinter, @atomitron, @kyngsnake, @ragedaisy and anyone else that wants to participate!

[sorrelchestnut]

2017 Fic in Review

Tagged by the wonderful @solas-you-nerd​, which is great because I find this sort of thing fascinating.  I decided to separate this into two sections, AO3 stats and ~author opinions.~  And to be fair and equitable, I've left Cry Havoc out of the stats section, since as a long-term WIP a lot of its numbers came from well before 2017, and shouldn't be counted.

STATISTICS

No surprise anywhere here.  The "top threes" are all the same fics, in the same order.  The clear favorite was for a new, active fandom that I was posting in right as it was getting going, and then some heavy falloff to the next two, which were rule 63 AU fics in a fandom that is past its heyday.  For that series, the fics received attention more or less in the order they were posted, with interest falling off as subsequent fics in the series were posted.

1. Your 3 fanfics with the most comment threads in 2017:

52: Shoot to Thrill (ME:A, f!Ryder/Reyes) 12: go home, or make a home (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo) 11: Songs You Know by Heart (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo)

2: Your 3 fanfics with the most kudos in 2017:

278: Shoot to Thrill (ME:A, f!Ryder/Reyes) 185: go home, or make a home (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo) 141: Songs You Know by Heart (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo)

3: Your 3 fanfics with the most bookmarks in 2017:

75: Shoot to Thrill (ME:A, f!Ryder/Reyes) 44: go home, or make a home (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo) 28: Songs You Know by Heart (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo)

4: Your first fanfic in 2017:

Posted 04-12-2017: Shoot to Thrill (ME:A, f!Ryder/Reyes)

5: Your last fanfic in 2017:

Posted 11/01/2017: Jeepers Creepers (FO4, Deacon gen)

6: Your longest fanfic in 2017:

23,984: Consider the Thorns (Hobbit movies, Thorin/f!Bilbo)

OPINIONS

1: Favorite opening line from a fic in 2017:

Bryony Baggins was, in the general way of things, a gentlehobbit.  (from go home, or make a home)

I actually love the whole opening section, but the first line was pretty good too.  It was my attempt to ape something of Tolkien's tone as best I could, and while other stories in the series (and, for that matter, the rest of the fic) diverged back to more my own style, this bit was fun to play with.  I particularly had a blast retooling the first conversation between Bree and Gandalf; for example, Bree stealing "I am Gandalf, and Gandalf is me!" line from the book.  It also made for a great whiplash to pull from that right into the aftermath of the battle, with all of the grief and hope that entailed.

2: Favorite ending line from a fic in 2017:

“I’m right behind you, ma’am,” he says, and it feels like the first true thing he’s ever said. “You can count on me.”  (from The Hollow Man)

This was SUCH an important line for me; well before I wrote this scene, it was always in the back of my head.  It's symbolic in the sense that he's saying "you can trust me at your back" which is a big thing since the last time they saw each other, she basically handed him a gun and a motive and dared him to shoot her.  It's also his way of expressing... not just loyalty, which she knew she had when he showed up, and not just affection, which she knew she had regardless of how he chose - but fealty.  Not a soldier following a commanding officer, but a knight swearing to a queen.  Which, despite the outward trappings of their relationship, is very much what they are.

3: Your favorite character to write for in 2017:

X6-88 was my dark horse favorite for 2017.  (Pun very much NOT intended.)  He's a man of VERY strong opinions, which make him a fantastic character, even if I don't agree with said opinions (or, for that matter, all of his actions).  He's a bundle of contradictions, and my favorite contradiction is how he can be so seemingly robotic and yet so hilariously human about some things.  He has doubts, and is startlingly honest about them.  He's such a prideful dick when it comes to being a courser; no else, save perhaps the Sole Survivor themself, really measures up to his standards, and he's not shy with his disdain.  But he's also bone-loyal, and not just because he's programmed to be, and he knows how to admit when he's wrong.

Also, he curses, and listening to him curse in that monotone voice is GREAT.  A shallow finish, but there we are.

4: Your favorite pairing to write for in 2017:

I really enjoyed writing Thorin/Bree, because I loved the chance to write belligerent sexual tension that is fun and snappy and not, like, bordering on abusive behavior.  But my real favorite is actually the tangled Sole/MacCready/X6-88 triangle.  When I first started writing what would eventually be The Hollow Man, I was working on it as a character piece but didn't really know how he'd fit into the existing Sole/Mac dynamic.  I thought he'd hate Mac and respect Sole - you can see that in the opening section, before the time jump.  But just look at X6's handoff dialogues.  There's basically three companions he judges worthy of looking after the Sole Survivor: Strong, because he's big and, well, strong enough to serve as a bodyguard; Danse, because he has the "training and equipment" to serve as a bodyguard; and MACCREADY.  "I know your reputation, MacCready.  I'm confident you can handle whatever threats you encounter."

Once I realized that X6 could - and would! - respect Mac, after getting the chance to actually see him at work, the rest just fell into place.  I liked writing Sole basically bludgeoning X6 into compliance using logic and charisma, but the most important part of that scene was always that X6 fell for Mac first; he was only able to see Sole for who she really is because of seeing her in context with MacCready.  Neither of them  could have brought X6 to the point of decision he reached in that fic on their own.

5: Your proudest fic from 2017:

Definitely go home, or make a home.  This fic shouldn’t exist, y’all.  I started it back in 2014, but it basically disappeared into the void once I started my final semester in grad school.  I always used to open it up, sigh wistfully about finishing it someday, and then put it back down.  And then this year, I was thinking about turning thirty and how it was this big landmark but didn’t feel like a big landmark, and I decided to make something of it by finishing an old WIP by my birthday.  And so I pulled that one out, dusted it off, and I fucking did it.  I had to come up with an ending and then redo the entire middle to make it more compliant with the third movie, but I did it.

Also, it stands out because my normal writing style for OCs is to describe them from the outside-in: you’ll notice that all of my video game fic is from the POV of the canon LI.  Cullen and Evelyn, Deacon and Whisper, Mac and Sole… it’s easiest for me to construct a character from their actions, rather than their feelings, but this was all Bree’s point of view.  So that’s a big thing for me, something I hadn’t much done before.

6: Any goals for 2018?

I have two bigs WIPs that I really, desperately want to finish: Cry Havoc, and everybody’s pickin’ up on that feline beat.  I think I’ve only got another few chapters left on Cry Havoc, and feline beat is halfway through its last chapter, and looking at maybe…  a dozen more scenes?  Ish?  Totally doable, assuming I don’t get distracted by other stuff like I usually do.  A stretch goal would be to finish The Narrow Way, but that chapter is like… three disconnected scenes with no beginning or ending, so that’s a considerably bigger challenge.

7: Tag some people.

I don’t really do individual tags, generally speaking, but you!  Person who is reading this who wrote something in 2017!  Consider yourself tagged!

[vault-heck]

Vault-Heck works Table of Contents

OC information Carrd

Longfics:

Wildfire - Explicit, Preston Garvey/Male Sole Survivor

playlist

Noah O'Neill is the awkwardest smooth talker you've ever met. Upon exiting Vault 111 cryostasis, he embarks on a journey to find his kidnapped son, prepared for the worst. As he struggles with the question of what kind of man he will become, he discovers unexpected hope in the new world around him.

I am currently rewriting wildfire, but will keep this version up and labeled 'legacy'.

The Birds Work for the Bourgeoisie - Mature

Set in the same timeline as What God Doesn't Give You, from the perspective of a non-SS OC. Contains spoilers for Wildfire.

Omen is the Railroad's best agent focused on counter-intelligence. Their penchant for befriending wildlife, entirely organic and otherwise, makes them uniquely equipped to observe those who take their privacy for granted. However, their methods are not without challenges.

What Makes a Man - Mature, pre-relationship Preston Garvey / Sole Survivor

This is the first segment of my Wildfire series re-write.

Nora Driscoll was a wife, and her husband is dead; a mother, and now her son is missing. She was an attorney, and the law is all but gone. Nora was a woman of God, and now, there's a crumbling church at the end of the street.

One Shots:

Her Hypothesis - Explicit, Curie/Female Sole Survivor

Evelyn agrees to help Curie test out one of her biomechanical side projects.

For Glad and Golden Hours - Teen, Multiple relationships, Gen

A Christmas story set in the Wildfire universe.

Respect for the Sport - Explicit, Preston Garvey/Male Sole Survivor

A fluff and smut one shot set in the Wildfire universe.

Tags unique(ish) to my work:

what god doesn't give you

noah o'neill

noah x preston

my ocs

my fics

my art