As the Cardinal Flies

It is the Yuletide of dreams, for I got two stories...and one of them is from The Lastborn of Elvinwood! Herewith my gifts and a short cluster of recs:

Written for me:

The Usual Arrangements by Anonymous
Length: ~1800 words
Fandom: The Lastborn of Elvinwood - Linda Haldeman
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Thomas Heaton, Merlin, Ian James

We're told that 'he told a tale well', but how would the Vicar spin Ian's first meeting with the little folk to his master?

I have been waiting for *years* for this story (and it was a pure and utter surprise when I found I'd gotten it). A clever and amusing spin on a key encounter between various principal characters.  Best. Yuletide.  Ever.  (Also, now that I think of it, actually, fairly comprehensible -- and possibly funny -- even if you haven't read the novel.)

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No Law Against Looking by Anonymous
Length: 100 words
Fandom: Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century (Cartoon)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Beth Lestrade

The rules of relationship can get tangled after two hundred years.

Heh.  Yes, they do, and here Lestrade is looking at Holmes from a doubly unique perspective.  Very well done indeed, and a worthy gift.

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And onward, to an assortment of recs.  One note in particular: I have been reading very erratically, such that I often have not read all the stories in any given fandom.  So a rec for one story in a given fandom is just that, and does not say anything one way or the other about other stories in that same fandom.

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Heaven's Coins  by Anonymous
Length: ~1550 words
Fandom: A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jacob Marley & Ebenezer Scrooge
Characters: Ebenezer Scrooge, Jacob Marley

Marley's haunting was all that saved Scrooge from eternal damnation. Years have passed and it is time to repay the favor.

A very interesting take on Scrooge's arrival in the hereafter.  On the one hand, this plays very straight with its Dickens; on another, though, there's a faint and fascinating resonance here between this piece and The Muppet Christmas Carol's choice to cast Statler and Waldorf as "Marley and Marley".

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Anno Domini 1915 by Anonymous
Length: ~500 words
Fandom: Dark Is Rising Sequence - Susan Cooper
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Merriman Lyon, Miss Greythorne (Dark Is Rising)

...I've just passed The Learning chapters in my reread of TDIR and recalled how much I love Miss Greythorne, so have some pre-canon Old Ones. I also hope this isn't too grim for a gift!

Not too grim at all in my book, though it's not perhaps a tale for the squeamish -- a fascinating, unusual pre-canon snapshot of Merriman and Miss Greythorne (one of my favorite characters, too), and the consequences of the choices one makes as an Old One.

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And Wings Made of Air by Anonymous
Length: ~1500 words
Fandom: Dobrenica Series - Sherwood Smith
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Marius Alexander Ysvorod and Aurelia Kim Murray
Characters: Marius Alexander Ysvorod, Aurelia Kim Murray

Marius Alexander Ysvorod, crown prince of Dobrenica, the day after his wedding...

Thoughtful and funny and sweet and wondrous (in the old-fashioned sense-of-wonder sense) in all the right places.  For me, the voice here catches precisely the echo I've noted in canon between this series and Elizabeth Peters' Vicky Bliss novels; the relationship between Alec and Kim has much the same texture as that between John and Vicky, though with something of a reversal of roles.

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Reasons of the Heart by Anonymous
Length: ~5300 words
Fandom: Jonny Quest
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jonny Quest & Hadji Singh, Benton Quest & Race Bannon
Characters: Jonathan "Jonny" Quest, Hadji Singh, Benton Quest, Race Bannon, Bandit (Jonny Quest)

“The heart has its reasons whereof reason knows nothing.” (Blaise Pascal)

A lovely, leisurely depiction of the evolution of a found family, perceptive and sensitive but not at all saccharine, invoking just the right touch of tension without devolving into angst.  Very canon-aware, and yet I think it holds up independent of canon; this is first-class writing whether or not you know the series.

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To Grandmother's Secret Lab We Go by Anonymous
Length: ~7400 words (4 chapters)
Fandom: Narbonic, Skin Horse (Webcomic)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Helen B. "Beta" Narbon, Dave Davenport, Artie | RT-5478, Mell Kelly, Caliban (Narbonic), Rosalind Narbon, Project UNITY, Dr. Helen A. "Alpha" Narbon, Captain's Fancy Valentine Sweetheart, Nick Zerhakker

While playing host to the Narbons, Mell gets tracked down by a relative... of sorts. But hers isn't the only unexpected family reunion in store, and soon the whole crew is on a cross-country Narbon-vs.-Narbon chase. Blood may be thicker than water, but are nanites thicker than blood?

For some reason, I didn't move on to Skin Horse after encountering and falling in love with Narbonic two-thirds or so of the way in.  Now I may have to change that, because this is at once a totally spectacular post-canon Narbonic adventure and a dropped-in-at-the-deep-end Skin Horse caper, and while I haven't read the latter strip at all, the story is hyperactively madcap enough that it holds up regardless.  Also, if I didn't know better, I'd seriously think I'd written this myself, because its style and structure remind me of my own Kim Possible/Narbonic crossover from some years back.  (I emphasize that this is a reminds-me-in-a-good-way note, not a criticism or complaint.)  Mad science has never been more fun than these characters make it, whether in Shaenon Garrity's hands or those of the present fanwriter.

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Mrs Pollifax Does Lunch by Anonymous
Length: ~2800 words
Fandom: Mrs. Pollifax - Dorothy Gilman
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: John Farrell & Emily Pollifax
Characters: Grace Hartshorne

A wintry day in New Brunswick, New Jersey is brightened considerably by an unexpected visitor.

Much of the tiny body of Pollifax fanfic takes place in New Jersey, between Mrs. Pollifax's espionage adventures.  This particular story raises the stakes, though, by setting up a face-to-face confrontation between veteran operative John Sebastian Farrell and Emily's notoriously inquisitive neighbor Miss Hartshorne.  Impressively, neither character blinks, and yet the resulting fireworks -- muted but undeniable -- arise from another angle entirely.  The result is a thoughtful treatment of all three characters that catches the authentic Gilman tone. 

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From Here to Eternity by Anonymous
Length: 100 words
Fandom: Valdemar Series - Mercedes Lackey
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Vanyel Ashkevron/Bard Stefen

Guarding the border has its moments. And sometimes it doesn't.

A brief, amusing look at afterlife in the Forest of Sorrows.  And possibly an argument for either Vanyel or Stefan being a distant ancestor of Calvin's -- and, as the obvious corollary, Hobbes being a Firecat.  (This story is not that fusion, but it might well lay the groundwork for such....)

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The Other Side by Anonymous
Length: ~1150 words
Fandom: Valdemar Series - Mercedes Lackey
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Sayvil, Kerowyn

Sayvil experiences Choosing from a new perspective.

Noteworthy both for the direct look at Companion life from backstage and for the neatly executed reverse spin on Kerowyn's moment of Choice from By the Sword.

Written for me:

The Madame Karitska Files (5636 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: Clairvoyant Countess Series - Dorothy Gilman, Ellery Queen (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Madame Marina Karitska, Polonius Faber-Jones, Laurie Faber-Jones, Simon Brimmer, Lieutenant Pruden
Summary: More Tales of Madame Marina Karitska

A pitch-perfect recapturing of the Karitska books' tone and structure, plus a bonus guest star crossover appearance -- also pitch-perfect -- by the inimitable (but usually wrong) Simon Brimmer from EQ.  Which is to say, two prompts elegantly filled at once, and how often does that happen?  Definitely a win for me this Yule season -- and both these being straightforward cozy-mystery fandoms, the story stands pretty well on its own, so that even the un-initiated should find the story accessible.

And a couple of quick early recs:

Velveteen Presents Victory Anna vs. Love (Which Is, After All, A Many-Splendored Thing). (5525 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Velveteen - Seanan McGuire
Rating: General Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Polychrome/Victory Anna
Summary:  And now for something completely different! Join one Science Heroine in her Perilous Quest to find her way to Solid Ground through the power of Science, Steam, and Epona's Own Grace.
If you've followed Seanan McGuire's Velveteen superheroine saga on LJ (especially the very newest material), this supplies a nifty chunk of back story for Victoria "Victory Anna" Cogsworth -- and whoever wrote this has got the Velveteen narrative voice down perfectly.   And strangely enough, because of the way this fits into series continuity, it's actually a decent entry point for folks who have (for some strange reason) not yet encountered the Vel-verse.  Highly, highly recommended; funny and sweet in equal measures.


Submitted For Your Approval (3849 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Muppets - All Media Types, Twilight Zone
Rating: General Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Gonzo the Great, Rod Serling (Twilight Zone)
Summary: A freak accident turns Gonzo’s latest stunt into a one-way ticket into the unknown.

Like my own gift story, this one accomplishes the uncommon feat of meeting two of the recipient's prompts in one swell foop.   Except when you're crossing the Muppets and the Twilight Zone, the results are both absolutely and spectacularly cracktastic and -- at the same time -- eerie and troubling and scarily plausible.  Which is to say, the author has the tone of both fandoms down flat, and that in itself makes the crossover work amazingly well.  I predict this to be one of the breakout hits of the year.

Have been madly busy with family Christmas and writing projects (of course the non-Yuletide project's plot bunnies chose to jump in front of the Yuletide ones), but am now more or less caught up...just in time to go on vacation -- and most likely Internet-free -- for a week.  [There will be a potentially borrow-able computer where I'm going, but I'm not at all sure of the 'Net access.]

However, some thanks are overdue already.

The Writer's Block Sleeps Tonight (Castle, Alexis-centric) was written for me in Yuletide proper, and is a wise and clever and funny story with a great many subtle in-jokes, bonus Martha/theater material, and much sensible writing advice.  I'm very pleased with and grateful for it, and look forward to thanking my writer properly when I get back next year. :-)

A Facade of Stone (Gargoyles, Xanatos & Owen (and Puck)) was my Yuletide Madness treat -- it's a post-episode tag to "The Price", in which Xanatos had acquired a magical cauldron and needed Owen to test it for him.  I can hear Jonathan Frakes and Jeff Burnett (and Brent Spiner) delivering the dialogue for this one...and would not be surprised if something like this turned up on an outtake reel somewhere.  Highly amusing, and a welcome treat indeed.

Castle in general did very well out of Yuletide this year; I'll give a blanket "thumbs up" to all 30 stories in the fandom.  There's also a handful of other very worthwhile Gargoyles fic in the archive, with a particular nod toward Checksum (Anastasia/Halcyon) -- sometimes you only need 100 words to draw a relationship.

I will also jump on a couple of bandwagons.  I hope to do more recs after I get back, and especially to do more obscure ones, but time considerations have had me mostly following others' trails of breadcrumbs in the early stages of Yuletide reading.

The Cable & Deadpool Yuletide Special (Marvelverse) bids fair to jump right into the top tier of legendary epic crackfics -- Carrot Juice, Earl Grey. Hot (aka Bugs Bunny vs. the Borg) still ranks highest on my all-time scale (and wonder of wonders, is now actually up on the 'Net), but this is easily in the top three both for utter wackiness and actual artistic depth.

And But Rather Darkness Visible ("Young Wizards"/Duane; Doctor Who) is way over on the opposite end of the scale, a quiet yet daring crossover that's admirably compact, strongly characterized, and completely believable as near-canon (right up to the use of Dairine as dispenser-of-wisdom, which is not a position that canon usually assigns her).

Not quite as widely noted is Another Rainbow in Another Sky (My Little Pony), a thoughtfully executed...I'd term it a "reawakening" rather than a reboot or re-imagining of the franchise that starts with Megan just arrived at college and ends on a moment that satisfies...and holds the promise of much more.  This is a story I'd like to see its author carry forward, and as good as Yuletide fic usually is, one doesn't see a lot of work with that kind of potential.

More later -- I hope!

As the fanfic world ramps up for Yuletide, posts elsewhere remind me that I ought to do a bit of fandom-promotion -- especially considering that I've nominated a whole slate of unreasonably obscure fandoms this time around.  Herewith the list:

Legend (tv)
Not the feature film with the unicorn, but the 1995 series starring Richard Dean Anderson and John de Lancie.  Yuletide's been fairly kind to fans of The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. -- it's time we had some new adventures for Ernest "Nicodemus Legend" Pratt and Professor Janos Bartok.

Kate Chambers - Diana Winthrop series
If there is a more obscure fandom in the entire Yuletide database, I'd be surprised.  This was a series of a half-dozen slim "teen sleuth" mysteries first published in the 1980s; the setup most closely resembles the Nancy Drew universe, but the settings were more realistic, the plots more complex, and the characterization somewhat more adult (anticipating the "Nancy Drew Files" incarnation of that series a bit, perhaps); the individual books also featured dedications/homages to various classic mystery writers.  There doesn't seem to be a good Web resource for the series, though individual titles are findable from the major used-book vendors (in some cases, at insane-looking prices).  "Kate Chambers", incidentally, was one of several pen names for a writer named Nicole St. John [not, apparently, children's mystery writer Wylly Folk St. John, as I initially thought] whose best-known nom de plume was probably Norma Johnston.

Linda Haldeman - The Lastborn of Elvinwood
A very brief summary of this novel: English bachelor and actor Ian James is walking home from his village's theater one evening when he notices two of his neighbors slipping quietly into the nearby wood -- and when he follows them, he finds himself in a Faerie court straight out of A Midsummer Night's Dream.  Except that the faeries are fading away, and as penalty for snoopiness Ian is recruited to help them exchange one of their own for the infant child of a visiting American family.  While the book is long out of print, it's findable in larger libraries and on the used market, and is well worth seeking out -- fans of Tanya Huff's more humorous books and those of the Wrede/Stevermer para-Regency fantasies should find this utterly charming.

Muppets
All right, the Muppets aren't really obscure at all -- but after signups closed last year, I realized that Kermit and friends had somehow not made the cut, and we certainly can't have two Yuletides in a row with no Muppetational content.

Robyn Tallis - Planet Builders series
Not quite as thoroughly forgotten as the Diana Winthrop books, but close.  This was a series of ten paperback-original SF novels dating from 1988-1989, featuring a sizeable ensemble cast of teen heroes and heroines living on a newly colonized planet -- sort of as if someone had hired Andre Norton to write a season of Veronica Mars in Space.  In this case, though, the "Robyn Tallis" alias belonged to a collective including Sherwood Smith (Inda), Debra Doyle and James Macdonald (The Price of the Stars), Bruce Coville (the Magic Shop books and others) and Mary Frances Zambreno (veteran writer of fanfic and YA fantasy).  Great straight-ahead classic SF adventure with much admirable teen-aged snark.  Copies are likely findable via the Net, but I have no good sense of how rare they may be -- still, this did get a bit of exposure in the genre community when the series appeared, so it's not completely unknown.

Tom Swift - Fourth Series
My favorite of the several incarnations of Tom Swift, boy inventor -- and it's not a coincidence that some of the writers behind these books were prior Planet Builders authors.  This version is notable for incorporating some nifty SFnal ideas, as well as a strong recurring villain in Xavier Mace aka the Black Dragon; also, there were thoughtful nods to prior continuity.

Now that Yuletide assignments have gone out, herewith the customary Dear Santa letter:

First of all, I am a fairly mellow Yuletider with wide reading interests.  That said, my attitude toward much slash (particularly m/m as opposed to femslash) is more or less meh.  I'm not opposed to it -- providing it arises plausibly out of the canonical character relationships -- and I've read a fair amount of slash that I've quite liked, but I am generally more interested in fic for story than I am for pairings as such.  (This is one reason I tend to specify single characters in Yuletide requests.)  Note that I say "story" rather than "plot", because I emphatically do not mean to suggest that I'm not interested in character-driven fic -- quite the contrary; OTOH, plot is also a Good Thing, and much appreciated.

You may also notice, if you glance backward at the fics and drabbles posted here (it's not that big a backlist), that I wander as often as not toward the comic side of the Force.  While I don't mind darkness in context, I am a real sucker for well-tuned humor, and I gravitate toward fandoms that incorporate comic elements. 

( As to the specific requests: )

Good luck, and good writing!

Well. Uploaded my primary Yuletide assignment almost a full day ahead of deadline (amusingly, after spending most of the night typing -- somehow, it didn't seem like that long till I looked at the clock). Promptly signed onto the pinch-hit list, but didn't see anything that grabbed me, but when the stocking stuffer list went live, I changed my mind and waded in; the stuffer went up just a few minutes ago. Still not dead sure whether it works or not -- it's an odd piece, and unusual for me in that I rarely work in literary-based fanfic universes. [By itself, that detail shouldn't be enough to give anything away....] We shall see, I expect.

Still also working on what would have been an NYR (and may be again, given something I saw go by on the pinch-hits), and the still-in-progress KP/Narbonic crossover. OTOH, it's unlikely any of those will post before the new year begins, as I'll be out of town and offline for part of the Week Between. I should, however, have comments in on my own Yuletide gift in timely fashion, and I look forward to all responses on the stories I've uploaded. It was a good experience, and I'll almost certainly be back next year.