#also I’ve finished a Ducktales fic I’ve been working on for a while!

[theeviltriplet-fromao3]

Okay so I finally figured out the ending for this new chapter for my TMNT fic Ace of Hearts! I just gotta write it down & polish it up!

I’m hoping to post it tomorrow :)

[theeauthor01]

Thank you @lets-try-some-writing for tagging me 😊

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 7

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 65,692

3. What fandoms do you write for? I’ve done My Hero Academia, Pokemon, Transformers, Star Wars and Ducktales.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. Becoming a Hero – 1,023 Kudos  - Ash Ketchum gets yeeted into the MHA world.

2. Diabolical Once More – 259 Kudos – Donald Duck has many secrets, Louie learns about one while being thrust into the machinations of a Loonitic.

3. Duck Timeline – 80 Kudos – Headcannon timeline of the Ducktales lore

4. Abstraction – 76 Kudos – Midoriya and Bakugou get amnesia and need to make like Jason Borne to figure out what is happening. Also, Eri is there being adorable.

5. How Pokemon Battle in “Becoming a Hero” – 58 Kudos – The title kinda gives it away

5. Do you respond to comments? Yes! I love responding to comments, but I know, I’ve missed a few

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? One day I may finish an actual story, and one of them will have that angsty tang, but I’m not saying which one  

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? When they reach completion there will be stories with happy endings, I just need to get there.

8. Do you get hate on fics? No, I’ve been reading fics for a long time. I have fun with them! But some of them do make me question the state of humanity, and I tend to use a lot of filters.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? No. Just no.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? I mean, my most popular fic probably counts.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? No, but I did have someone ask if they could base a different fic off of one of mine. I said sure, and they almost copied the dialogue exactly. I pointed this out and gave them pointers on how to make it more their own. They have since deleted that fic. I do not know if anyone has stolen any of my fics though.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? No. I wouldn’t mind it though

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Nothing on Ao3.

14. What's your all time favorite ship? Yeah… thing about that is I’m not a shippy person. I prefer platonic stuff, there are a lot of character dynamic stuff I like, but I’m not really a romantic.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Look, it may take me years, but I’m gonna finish one of them, if not all of them, for sure.

16. What are your writing strengths? I like to think I’m good at characterization, getting into the minds of a character and let them act in a story how they would based on who they are.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? Descriptions? Fight scenes? Villians.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? Its neat, I just also like if there is a translation somewhere, but I can guess what’s being said if there is good enough context clues.

19. First fandom you wrote for? Entangled War, it was my Transformers and Clone Wars crossover. I’m sure there are others from before, but that was the first I posted

20. Favorite fic you've written? I like all my fics, my favorite depends on where the hyperfixation takes me.

Now I'm tagging @virgilisspidey, @doritooooo, @smokescreenstuff

those are the blogs that just poped into my head

Tagged by @skeletonsgeorg, thank you so much!!!!

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 21

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 176,709

3. What fandoms do you write for? Right now, just Transformers but I used to write Fullmetal Alchemist fics.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. Fun at Work- FMA, roy/ed, this is smut be warned. Kudos: 178 2. Saturdays- FMA, Roy/Ed, SFW Kudos:167 3. 4 Million Years- My first TF fic and my first fic after an 8 year writing hiatus. Megop, Kudos: 128 4. Crossing the Line- Megop, def valveplug going on inthis. kudos: 128 5. A New Kind of Word Sparring- Megop, SFW, Kudos: 100

5. Do you respond to comments? Yes! I try to respond to most comments but sometimes I miss some.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? oooh probably this fma one: Regrets

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? I... don't actually know tbh. a lot of my fics are just little oneshots that already were happy.

8. Do you get hate on fics? I used to, a long time ago. It's part of why I stopped writing for so long but honestly the worst of the hate came to my roleplay blogs, not my fics.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Yessssssss smut is my fav thing to write actually. its fuuuun.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? Not really? I'm not opposed to it though if it makes sense.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? IDK

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? No.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Yes! I co-write with @lets-try-some-writing! We're working on a TF AU together called Two Sides to a Coin.

14. What's your all time favorite ship? Megop omg it has me by the throat.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Omg... I have so many I can't even think of just one... I ahve a REALLY hard time finishing fics, its why I usually just write one shots... but I have a mechpreg megop au i was working on that I WANT SO BAD TO FINISH but am intimidated by its scope.

16. What are your writing strengths? I don't actually know tbh... i know what I have the most fun writing, but Idk if that counts as my strenghts.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I'm on of those people that tends to only care for the romantic parts of the story, so I tend to skip by a lot of other things cuz I just dont care about it often.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? I think its cool!

19. First fandom you wrote for? Shoot I think it was Yu-Gi-Oh?? Maybe Pokemon. idk i don't really remember.

20. Favorite fic you've written? Right now I think it was Until Next Time, Prime. It was just really fun to get into how megatron felt about Optimus post Optimus yeeting himself into the Well.

Tagging: @lets-try-some-writing, @steelthroat, @cyberrose2001 anyone else who wants to do the thing!

[rockinlibrarian]

Fic Writer Review

@pixiedane tagged everyone on this, and considering I've been wallowing in my sudden Being Into Fanfic lately (though to be honest I've been READING a lot lately more than writing), see this link, I figured I'd take her up on the challenge. You, too, may take ME up on the challenge if YOU have been writing fic!

how many works do you have on AO3? 19. That's much less than @pixiedane! I'm a baby fic writer!

what’s your total AO3 word count? 66,239

how many fandoms have you written for and what are they? There are technically seven listed, but "Marvel Cinematic Universe," "The Avengers (Marvel Movies)," "Captain America (Movies)," and "Agent Carter (TV)" all apply to the same fic, so really just 4. But that doesn't count fandoms I've written but not completed (and therefore posted) for. So there are more to come. Maybe. Sometime.

what are your top 5 fics by kudos? *

"On the End of Endgame," 51 kudos, because I'm right and Marvel doesn't understand their own time travel rules and 51 people KNOW it!

"The Puppy-Fly Effect," 39 kudos, because it's Back to the Future, the most mainstream property I've written for! So people see it and say, "oh, I've actually seen that one" and they're more likely to read it!

"The Invitation: an Epilogue," 22 kudos, which is pretty good since this is my newest fic on there. It's a Howl's Moving Castle (BOOK, PLEASE, OBVIOUSLY) epilogue, so considering it's not a RECENT thing it just keeps getting slow and steady readership. I myself have been reading a lot of Howl fic lately, and people are getting comments on their decade-old stories from me now, so I imagine this one also will slow and steadily keep accumulating hits and kudos.

"Kerry and the Meaning of Life," 20 kudos. I'm honestly not sure why this is, by far, my most kudoed Legion FX fic. It's the first one I ever wrote, and got me started on the whole writing-the-entire-Loudermilk-coming-of-age rabbit hole I fell into to begin with, but I've only improved over time, I think, but even after I'd posted other Loudermilk backstory I think is objectively better, this one still gets the most!

"Syd's (Third) Childhood Begins," 15 kudos, because when people finish watching Legion FX the NATURAL move is to seek out fix-it fic. I wouldn't say this is fix-it really as much as ensure-the-ending-is-actually-happy-it, but I did use the "fix-it" tag, and at least one of the commenters DID say they immediately came on AO3 "looking for pretty much exactly this"...

do you respond to comments, why or why not? Absolutely, because I know what it feels like NOT to get comments, and also what it feels like to-- I don't know, I just get paranoid, if people don't respond to me, I think stuff like "Did I say something wrong? Do they not care about my opinion? Am I invisible?" so I'm Do Unto Others-y about it, even if all I can think of to say is "Thank you!"

what’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? Well, I haven't actually posted (read: finished) the ending yet, but it's definitely "Exploration of the Astral Plane," because that's just Legion FX canon. No spoilers, Oliver Bird starts out the show having gotten lost decades ago, and this is the story of HOW he got lost, and his friends didn't KNOW if they'd ever see him again, so the paragraphs I've written of the end do make me quite teary! The fic's really fun despite the canonically sad ending, though, honest!

do you write crossovers? if so what is the craziest one you’ve written? I have not written one YET, if I recall, unless you count the several mildly interconnected IPs involved in the Pipeweed Mafia Stories, which isn't even posted because I feel uncomfortable posting Real People fic online, but crossovers are fun and I really enjoy reading them, especially when the writer successfully blends things together while being true to the characters. Just today I read a hilarious one blending The Good Place and Harry Potter!

have you ever received hate on a fic? Gosh, this is such an ironic question. I wouldn't say that I WISH I received hate on a fic, but my fics aren't even NOTICED enough to receive hate! I already feel paranoid-- Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, you know how it is-- when I don't receive LIKE on a fic! It's LIKE receiving hate for me, because my brain goes into "Does nobody like it? Does nobody care? Are they all too nice to say it's terrible?" mode, so, yeah.

do you write smut? if so what kind? Absolutely not. My demisexual self hates reading it, definitely not writing it. I struggled enough writing just a taste of what a horny, slutty teenager who-talks-too-much Oliver Bird would have been in this AU, and that's mild!

have you ever had a fic stolen? Not that I'm aware of. That would really suck, wouldn't it, if someone stole my work and ended up getting MORE LIKES AND COMMENTS THAN ME on it.

have you ever had a fic translated? Also not that I'm aware of, and if I'm not aware of it but it happened I guess that would answer the "stolen" question, too.

have you ever co-written a fic before? Ever in my entire life, I feel like I must have, but not anything I've posted online then

what’s your all time favorite ship? Hmm. Honestly, there are ships I defend passionately if the topic comes up, but I'm not sure I have a favorite just on my own. Especially as I hate smut, so I avoid seeking out specifically shipping stories. But, since I have been reading a lot of HMC fic lately, I should mention that Howl and Sophie ARE one of my absolute favorite fictional couples, but that's just how DWJ wrote them, and I can tell you unfortunately that not all fanfic writers QUITE nail that chemistry...

what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? Speaking of The Good Place, I really do wish I could write the novelization, and maybe I'd write some pieces of it longer than the few paragraphs I have written? But I doubt I ever will, let alone to the point of FINISHING...

what are your writing strengths? Fanfic wise, I like to THINK I understand the characters very well, at least! Writing in general? I think it's just my quirky voice? I'm the only me.

what are your writing weaknesses? Oh, very much FINISHING. But beyond that, it's pulling teeth to get me to fill out the story sometimes. I tend to draft with dialogue, and then I have to go back and fill in what's actually happening AROUND the dialogue, and sometimes I'd rather not.

what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? At first I was like, I don't KNOW any other languages well enough to do this! And then I remembered the Firefly fic I have mostly written but not completed yet, and you know how in the show their speech is peppered with random Mandarin phrases? My husband has the Firefly RPG book and there's an appendix of Mandarin phrases you might hear in the Firefly universe, and I DID incorporate a few of those phrases into my dialogue, just from that appendix and it's probably horrible, but it fit the universe...

what was the first fandom you wrote for? EVER? The earliest I'm sure about is the Ducktales fic I found in an old Girl Scout manual that I must have written when I was 11 or 12. The first fandom I ever posted on AO3, in response to an exchange, was Legion FX of course, but that wasn't until the ripe old age of 40.

what’s your favorite fic you’ve written? I'm going to give this one to "Two (or Three) Mutant Freaks Against the Fourth Grade" just because it has gotten the least number of hits of ANY of my posts, INCLUDING THE PLACEHOLDER WITH NO WORDS IN IT, so it needs more love. And it really is one of my favorites, because it's just a sweet little story about nerds making friends, and I love rereading it.

*This made me curious which fics got the most kudos comparative to their HITS, because the Endgame one has WHOA more hits than any other fic, but it's over a thousand, which doesn't make 51 kudos look so good anymore. Percentage-wise, it's less than 5%, which seems to be where most of my fics hit when you do the math-- between 4% and 8% kudos-to-hits. The exceptions, jumping up to about 18% each, are the BttF and HMC fics, and, curiously, my beloved childhood friend AU mentioned in the last question-- it may have the least number of HITS (22), but that helps the math when you consider it's got 4 kudos. The HIGHEST percentage kudos-to-hits is its sequel, the childhood-friends-as-teenagers-AU fic mentioned in question 5**-- it's got 6 kudos and only 29 hits, so that's about 20%! Apparently people LIKE when I have to write a sex-crazed adolescent boy. COME ON, people! (The story is actually about Asexuality so I guess it really isn't people just wishing I'd write smut).

**Oh, I just noticed the numbers renumbered themselves when I put bullet points in the middle of the original question 3 there, so this is actually the answer to question 8? But it SAYS FIVE.

[dappercritter]

Critter Update: THIS AGAIN

Yup, I’m still conscious. Still capable of thought beyond reblogs and memes. You’re probably wondering just what I’ve been up to.

Where’s my next fic? That art blog? When am I gonna draw again at all? Am I ok, actually? Am I doing anything actually interesting? Among others, I’m sure.

Well, I think it’s time to offer some answers to where I’ve been and what I’ve done. However little of it there may be.

-I’ve been trying to work through some of my biggest problems. Namely depression, anger management, health, and disorganization.

-For starters, thanks to some family intervention, I’ve started looking at jobs again. I applied for my first a couple weeks ago but so far it hasn’t gone anywhere. (Nor am I sure it would in the first place.)

-Still got to make time for that art blog. But hopefully I can finally get it started before too long.

-Speaking of art, I have some plans to start making fanart again, and to post some concepts for my long-awaited next Entrapdak fic soon as well.

-I realize that I have been keeping a lot of my friends waiting after I promised to review their fics. (You know who you are. Poor guys.) I haven’t been making the time for it I should have but I have some reorganizing with my schedule and hopefully I should have more time for reviewing your work and giving it the feedback it deserves in the very near future.

-Star vs. The Monstrosities of Magic is making slow but absolutely steady progress. Me and @full-moon-phoenix are making good headway with plotting the overall story, and we’ve even started plotting out some of the episodes from start to finish. If you want to know more about our rewrite so far, check out our tiktok accounts for character and plot previews here. If you want to help out with the rewrite itself or get an inside look, come join our Discord server. Just DM me or phoenix if you want to get an invite. We’re always looking for new members to offer a fresh perspective and their talent to our ambitious rewrite.

-The outline for Tales from Beast Island is well on it’s way as well. It’s taken some time, I admit, but I am working to deliver the best continuation of Hordak and Entrapta’s story I can, while also doing justice for their friends and frenemies. Oh, and Beast Island, too of course. On a sidenote, I might just be making and posting some concept art in the near future. (*charming wink*)

-Taking even more of my sweet time with Gamera: Guardian of Hope while I develop the characters, monsters, and stories. I can’t say much about it right now, but I want to make sure I can create the most exciting and endearing story I can with the Friend to Children and Guardian of the Universe at it’s core.

-My Super Electronic Robot Hero Friend, Jet Jaguar will now be the next kaiju fic in line and it might just be getting an outline before long too.

-Godzilla: The Monster Age is undergoing a few overhauls to the story as it sits on the backburner to make it stronger both tonally and logistically speaking.

-Speaking of fanfiction, in the meantime, I’m seriously considering writing a one-shot or a ficlet to keep my writing senses sharp while I’m in between bigger projects like Monstrosities of Magic and Tales from Beast Island. I won’t say anything is set in stone just yet, but I do have some candidates in mind:

Phantom Blot and Pepper (Ducktales 2017)

The Big O

Villainous

More Entrapdak (Yes, really.)

-On an almost entirely unrelated note, I started developing my first original story but ended up picking something different to be it. What am I talking about? Eh, you’ll find out. Someday... Eventually... When the time is right... Eventually...

That’s all the news that is news. All of which I looked forward to sharing with you!

[darkwingsnark]

FIC WRITER MEME

Tagged by @prince-luffy

AO3 name: DarkwingSnark

Fandoms: ...SEE, I’m in lots of fandoms. Or at least, I’ve written for them during hyper-fixation periods. Let’s see what AO3 says...

Batman: The Animated Series (20)

Batman - All Media Types (7)

Wander Over Yonder (Cartoon) (6)

DuckTales (Cartoon 1987) (5)

Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero (5)

Penguins of Madagascar (3)

James and the Giant Peach - Roald Dahl (3)

Darkwing Duck (Cartoon 1991) (3)

Disney - All Media Types (3)

Dan Vs. (2)

Milo Murphy's Law (2)

Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja (1)

The Batman (Cartoon) (1)

Lady and the Tramp (1955) (1)

Looney Tunes | Merrie Melodies (1)

Winnie-the-Pooh - All Media Types (1)

Alice in Wonderland (1951) (1)

Gummi Bears (TV) (1)

Winnie-the-Pooh (Disney) (1)

.... Honestly, I feel like there’s more that this list isn’t covering. Like Phineas and Ferb isn’t here and I wrote for that show too. And many of these can be simplified and condensed because they belong to similar fics.

Tropes: Depends on the fic. But as a whole, tend to write Romantic Comedies with a lot of slow burn. Mostly because... struggle is funny. People being dumdums and oblivious to the obvious is funny. Aaaaand also because it allows the episodic quality of shenanigans to occur.

Number of fics: Up and posted on AO3? 53. Does not include stuff on FF.net or that’s sitting in google docs begging to be finished.

Fic I spent the most time on: Not sure how to read this. Does it mean active man hours? Or does stuff like having a hiatus in-between count? Because TECHNICALLY ‘Real Value’ was started in high school, and I didn’t rewrite it and carry on the series (with Moonie) until many years later. There are also fics like ‘Growing Love’ or ‘Priorities’ that took a lot of time to do research. Like learning how to build a lawn mower so I could have a character believably break it apart for repairs.

....God I do a lot of research that doesn’t go into the actual fics. Because all I need, really, in the confidence of what I’m doing to be the character and describe an action here or there. 

Fic I spent the least time on: Probably something drabble related? Or maybe the fic I did that was just me venting out emotions because I was feeling guilty? ‘A Mother’s Intuition’ was written and posted within a couple of hours.

Longest fic: Complicated. The longest thing written is technically an RP, NOT a story. (Different, trust me.) ‘What Happens in Gotham’ has a word count of  207,413. But fic wise at 89,022 word would be ‘The Constant Gardener’ . 

Runner up being ‘Priorities’ at little over 87k.

Shortest fic: Drabbles? Uh, let’s see.. Probably from ‘Beauty and Your Worth’, as i think one was literally a paragraph long. ... Speaking of Gummi Bears, I wonder if I still have my notes on the GruffiGusto fic I wanted to write. Something to look into.

Most hits: Apparently ‘Fallen Hard’ at  5354

Most kudos: Also ‘Fallen Hard’ at 518. There... were more fans of Milo Murphy’s Law than I realised. 

Most comment threads: ‘Fallen Hard’, 193 comments. ‘What Happens in Gotham’ following at 185.

Most bookmarks: .... that’s something people care about? I hardly ever bookmark things, since I read it in one go. But... I can look?

Ah.... ‘Fallen Hard’. 63

Total word count: 971,833 Oh hey! Almost a million. That’s something to celebrate.

Favorite fic I wrote: 'Knights of Dobenshire’. Hands down. (With ‘Heart of the Cards’ being very close.) I like writing road trip styled stories. It allows many things to happen within the narrative. BUT, ‘Knights of Dobenshire’ wins because it was such a satisfying conclusion of this build up, you know? Scrooge is finally no longer just putting up with the relationship with Fenton, but fully embracing it. That surprise feeling that hits him when he realizes, dear lord, he IS attracted to Fenton beyond affection. 

It hits me more than a mutual pining because there I KNOW they will get together. But here? While writing with Moonie? I DIDN’T KNOW! I was worried in the end we’d have to write another fic to finally reach that step. Scrooge is stubborn and does what he wants, let me tell ya.

Fic you want to rewrite/expand on: 'Fallen Hard’, ‘Season of Miracles’, ‘Going with the Flow’, pretty much anything that isn’t complete. BUT, not posted, I really want to get back to more of the stories planned in the McCrack series. It was a ship I kinda made from the ground up, with nobody caring about it in the beginning. So it feels very important to see that series through.

Share a bit of a WIP or a story idea you’re planning on:

... Actually, I can share something from 'Donald’s Party (Working Title)’. @swampy-tiefling and I started. Just the first scene to get you guys hooked.

Donald took a deep breath of air from the doorway of the house and sighed, once again pleased to find himself at his home away from home. Traveling the seas and exploring the world with the navy were its own rewards, he supposed, but there would never be anything quite like the countryside-- the middle aged mallard having practically been raised on Grandma Duck’s farm. Donald Duck was happy to be on shore-- his naval carrier being docked for the week in Duckburg as they replenished supplies and took care of whatever repairs that were needed. Whatever excuse his bosses wanted to use were fine by him, he was just happy to not be scrubbing decks for a change!

That didn’t, however, mean he was able to rest and relax-- as the duck was startled out of his thoughts as somebody bumped into him. That somebody was his grandmother as she came to, just having caught her plate of cookies before they fell.

“My land, Donald! What in the world are you doing hiding here when you should be meetin’ and greetin’ the guests?”

Donald ignored the woman’s soft glare as he waved her off, using his other hand to steal a cookie in the process. Stuffing it in his mouth, he murmured out a response.

“Phooey, they’re just relatives.”

“Even more of a reason to go out and talk to them.” Before the sailor could argue, Grandma Duck placed the plate of treats into his hands. “And put these out on the snack table while you’re at it. Poor Fethry is looking peckish.”

Donald rolled his eyes, but otherwise did as he was told. Wasn’t it just like life to make him work at his own welcome home party? Walking towards the open yard where the party was taking place, it didn’t take long to reach the table, where his cousins were already gathered around as they chat.

This instantly caught the attention of the lankier duck, his gaze zoning in as he smiled widely towards Donald in greeting.

“Well if it ain’t the guest of honor, with snacks to boot!” Fethry leaned closer, his red hat wobbling with him as he continued to inquire. “Say, cuz, ya wouldn’t happen to know if these are gluten free, would ya?”

Donald gave him an unimpressed look. 

“You’re not going on another crazy diet, are ya?” Though, in all honesty, he was more worried his looney cousin might try to drag him along-- and after months of eating nothing but mush, he would NOT miss out on his first chance to pig out on actual home cooked meals.

"Not crazy at all, actually!" Fethry grinned that goofy grin. "See, it's all right here; Gluten Free; It's the Way to Be' !" he shoved a rather lengthy-looking hard cover book in Donald's face. Donald had no choice but to stare at it, the words all blurring together from its close proximity to his eyes. The offending object remained there for only a second, however, before it was yanked back, the nutty mallard already busy flipping through it.

"Let's see, here, there's a fascinating chapter I think you should-- Don?"

Phew, that had been close. Donald was still in sneaking away mode, and jumped and yelped when he was tapped on the shoulder. Oh no. He'd been caught, after all. He slowly turned, with a forced, toothy grin, to face his fate.

A wave of relief washed over him when he saw his girlfriend, Daisy, smiling sweetly at him, instead.

“And where do you think you’re sneaking off to, Mister? You’ve been gone for so long, and here we are, with you haven’t even given me a kiss ‘hello’ yet.” 

Now there was something Donald didn’t mind doing, as his girlfriend leaned in her face for her reward. Wrapping his arms around her, he planted the biggest of smooches to her temple. 

“Gaww, I’m sorry Daisy. I really did miss you.”

This earned him a soft smile, as it was Daisy’s turn to kiss him on the forehead.

“And I missed you, hun. Now, tell me… why WERE you sneaking around?”

“Grandma put me on entertainment duty.”

“Well, “ his girlfriend began, “it IS your party, after all. They came to see you, seems fair to me.” This made the sailor groan as she looked at him unsympathetically. Rolling her eyes, the reporter sarcastically patted her boyfriend in comfort. “There there. Now don’t go sneaking off for real, the boys will be arriving soon. And Grandma tells me Uncle Scrooge will be bringing along a special guest.”

“Special guest?” Donald asked incredulously. “Like who?” This caused Daisy’s eyes to glimmer all the more in mischief, a look that told him that she knew something he didn’t know. And that something was big news, if he was reading her right.

“Oh, nobody TOO special, I suppose,” Daisy was stalling, and it was driving Donald up the wall. The duck woman continued her teasing. “Nobody except your uncle’s new date friend.”

"Date friend?" Donald practically exclaimed, prompting Daisy's grin to grow all the more smug.

"Yep! You've missed quite a bit since you've been away, you know."

"No kidding...well I'll be..." Donald was shaking his head, but he was smiling. Uncle Scrooge, dating, at his age... it was nothing short of a miracle. It was about time, too!

"Meanwhile, why don't you go say hi to the rest of the guests? I know it's hard..." she rolled her eyes. "but at least make an effort, okay? Thanks, hun!"

Donald's heart fluttered as she smooched his cheek, and left. He glanced out over the yard, and saw quite a few familiar faces; Gus, Ludwig, Gladstone... heck, even Gyro Gearloose had shown up!

He sighed, but this one wasn't a sigh of pure despair. It did feel nice to be home, surrounded by people who most likely cared, and his nephews were even going to show up soon. Not to mention, he'd get to tease his uncle for finally taking his advice on the whole dating thing. 

That alone gave Donald the pep in his step he needed as he threw himself back into the party-- where he knew his crazed family would be waiting for him. 

[vanilla107]

The Apology

Okay, so I binged the entirety of Ducktales over the last couple months and now I'm in a new fandom (whoo-hoo!). 

The inspiration of this fic came from the fact that Scrooge was going through quite a difficult time with the boys after he told them how Della went missing. He lashed out at Webby saying that she wasn't family and HOLY SHIT MAYBE THAT LINE BROKE ME??

It was never addressed again in the series (well not that I remember) and I really wanted Scrooge to apologize so that's how this fanfiction was born!

Thank you for reading! If you want to yell at me about She-ra, Ducktales, Miraculous Ladybug or musicals, then message me!

Thank you for reading and if you enjoyed it leave a comment!

Read on AO3

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“But there was a reason I came here before seeing your work-”

“Oh is it a new adventure? I’ll start packing!” she squealed but he gently grabbed her hand to stop her from running off.

“That reason is to apologize to you, Webbigail.”

--- The following months after the attempted Moonvasion, Scrooge McDuck pays a visit to the one duck he owes an apology too, Webbigail Vanderquack.

Webbigail Vanderquack grinned as she closed the trunk of the files she had now over-flowing with information of Christine van Duck, a distant relative of Scrooge McDuck and famous opera singer, who she had met just several hours ago after in the South of Italy. The adventure had been a simple ‘whodunit’ mystery and it didn’t take long for them to find out who the culprit was. She selected the photo of Christine on the opening night of one of her most well known performances, her brown eyes sparkling and the striking blue satin dress she wore contrasted with the red backdrop of the curtains.

Webby got her step ladder and took the one photo she needed and pinned it to her board, the red lines connecting with the other relatives of Scrooge. The young duck stood back and admired her work as her door creaked open. She turned to greet the visitor, expecting the one of the usuals: Huey, Louie, Dewey, Lena or Violet but she never expected the man she admired herself, Scrooge McDuck, to be standing there.

“Mister-! Mister McDuck I...I wasn’t expecting you!” she screeched as she fell off the ladder in a panic only to be caught by the billionaire, who managed to catch her just in time.

“Woah! Easy there lass! I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he chuckled as he placed her back on the ground and picked up his cane that he had dropped.

“I...I just didn’t think you’d ever come into my room so you startled me!” she said scrambling back to her board and trying to cover it with the curtain on either side.

“Webbigail, what are you hiding-?”

“Nothing! Nothing at all! Nothing suspicious of your family history or your genealogy! Nope!”

“Um...you should slow down you might trip-”

Before he could finish his sentence, the young duck tripped over her legs and she fell to the floor once more, the curtain ripping and exposing the board of the McDuck family that she was so desperately trying to hide.

The Scotsman was silent as he stared at the board filled with photographs, documents and red string.

“Webby...did you do all of this?”

“Yes! No! I...yes I did,” she said, her cheeks flaming red with embarrassment.

It wasn’t that she was embarrassed showing her interest for the McDuck family. She loved every aspect of the crazy family and the fact that she got to go on adventures with them daily was a dream come true but the very duck she idolized, witnessing her efforts...it was a different story. It was like being a proud fan of a famous pop star. You didn’t mind showing off your love of them to your friends or the world and it’s okay because what is the chance that the pop star will see it? But then one day said pop star rocks up at your house unannounced and see your room full of posters, merchandise and it’s just mortifying.

Even though she lived under the same roof as the billionaire, there were at least a hundred rooms in the mansion. There wouldn’t be a reason for him to be in her room but there his stood.

Standing in her room and looking at her life’s work.

“Is this...is this my whole family?” he asked, gently trailing a finger from one picture to another, following the red string.

“Yes...well no...there’s a few distant relatives, a couple family friends and on the extended side-”

She went around the board and pulled out the hidden extension, making the board twice as long. On the board there was a list of all of Scrooge’s enemies, acquaintances, family friends he didn’t really consider family friends, distant relatives that he didn’t even know were relatives, cousins twice removed and the employees at the Money Bin.

His jaw dropped and Webby felt her stomach churn in panic.

“You...you did all of this yourself?” he murmured, reaching out to touch a photo of him and the boys.

She looked down to the floor, clenching her hands into fists. There was no point in lying and even if she did, she was a terrible liar.

“Yes. It’s my life work. I know it’s kinda creepy especially since you’re here now and looking at it all-”

“Lass this is amazing!” he said excitedly.

“-And I know that it’s weird collecting information that you probably already know- Wait what? Did you just say-?”

“You heard me! It’s amazing Webby! And with regards to your previous statement...I think you might have more information than the official McDuck archives! This’ll give Quackfaster a run for her money!” he laughed before looking through the extended board more closely.

“I...I...Thank you...I’m glad you like it,” Webby said, in shock that the Scrooge McDuck said she might have more information than the archives she had spent years trying to get into until the boys came along. “I...I mean it’s nothing in comparison to your parent’s home. That castle is filled to the brim with McDuck history.”

“While that may be true, you have documented accounts of every adventure we’ve had so far. The current archives haven’t documented my adventures since my last one which was quite a while ago and I’ll bet me lucky dime that you know all the history already?” he asked with a smile and Webby couldn’t contain her excitement.

It was like a dam inside her exploded, her passion leaking from every feather on her body. She rushed around her room, collecting maps, postcards and her trusty journal.

“I know as much as I’ve read! My knowledge on certain people was restricted initially but when Louie, Huey and Dewey moved in, they’ve given me access that I never would’ve had. Going on adventures with you guys helps too!” she said cheerfully, showing him the journal of carefully curated adventures they’ve been on completed with drawings.

Scrooge leafed through her journal gently, being careful to read the first few pages before handing it back to her.

“Bless me bagpipes, this is impressive Webbigail! I’m a little surprised I haven’t seen this sooner.”

“O-Oh, it’s not like I hide it or anything. You’re always so busy at the Bin and after we come back from adventures, we can be a little tired. It’s also a history of you and you know a lot about your family anyway-“

“I was talking about why you haven’t showed me.”

“Oh...well I um...it is a little weird. I know Huey, Louie and Dewey support me wanting to learn about your family but...it’s not every day that the duck you look up to waltz into your room and sees that you’re passion is the history of him and his family. It’s an obsession and even though you are fully aware that I like your family history, it’s different seeing a huge board leaking with information.”

“I think it’s spectacular! If anyone tells you different, then they have no taste. You can tell them that the richest duck in the world told you that,” he said as he straightened his hat and gave her a smile.

Webby giggled, her face still warm from the previous embarrassment but a comforting warmth spread through her body.

“Hmm...I’m sure there’s an internship at the archives... I’ll have to ask Quackfaster,” he murmured and Webby felt her heart grow a thousand times bigger at those words.

“But there was a reason I came here before seeing your work-”

“Oh is it a new adventure? I’ll start packing!” she squealed but he gently grabbed her hand to stop her from running off.

“That reason is to apologize to you, Webbigail.”

Her giggling stopped before she looked up at him, a confused expression on her face.

“Apologize? For what?”

The duck looked down, regret on his face.

“Remember when you and the boys found out the truth about the reason Della was gone...the day we were all trapped on the Sun Chaser? I told you...you that you weren’t family,” he said, wincing as if the memory physically hurt to remember.

Hearing those words again was like a punch to the gut.

Webby would be lying if she had to say she hadn’t cried herself to sleep that night, those words echoing in her head. After rescuing her grandma from Black Heron, Scrooge had given her honorary family status and the title of his great niece.

But all of that was ripped away in a sentence that day.

“Yeah...I remember,” she said, her voice already wobbly.

She took a seat on her bed and he joined her, placing a hand on her shoulder

“I wasn’t thinking rationally and I let my emotions get the better of me. Bringing up Della and being blamed for the reason she was gone...it reopened a wound that had been festerin’ for years. I’m sorry Webbigail, you and your grandma are family and mean the world to me. I hope you can forgive me.”

“Of course I forgive you Mister McDuck,” she said and jumped into his arms to hug him.

He was frozen at first but recovered quickly as he hugged her back.

“That’s Uncle Scrooge to you missy,” he smiled and when they broke off the hug, he was startled to see that she had tears dripping down her face.

“Oh no, no crying today. Here you go, lass,” Scrooge said as he gave her a handkerchief and she blew her beak loudly, smiling happily through the tears.

“Now, I’ve already told the boys that we’re going on an adventure to find the ancient texts of Lalakii that were lost in a raid hundreds of years ago. The Lalakii tribe is desperate to get them back and we need to return it to them. Any treasure we find is ours, per the agreement I made with them, but those texts are our main priority. We leave for the Frenzy Jungle in an hour.”

Webby nodded as she wiped away the last of her tears, the load of emotions ebbing away slowly.

“Oh and Webby, I’d like to go on an adventure with you. I’ve been on so many with the boys but only one with you and we made a great team then. What do you say? I’ll even pack in your favourite drink!”

“Yes!” she exclaimed, shaking with excitement.

“Great! I’ll see you downstairs in an hour! I need to go pack.”

“Wait Mister- I mean Uncle Scrooge...you know my favourite drink?” she asked, her eyes wide with curiosity. She knew he had difficulty remembering it last time.

“Of course I do! It’s juice like you said after we saved your granny,” Scrooge said with a grin before walking out of her room whistling a happy tune.

He heard her let out a squeal of happiness and as he walked down the corridor he felt a weight lift off of him. He had been carrying that on him for months but after the return of Della and the Moon invasion, he was always preoccupied. But after properly apologizing to Webby, someone who he really cared about, it all felt right.

“Alright, now time for a new adventure!” he said as he pulled out his phone and dialed Quackfaster.

“Morning Quackfaster! I’m about to go on another adventure-”

“Ugh, Scrooge you know I can’t keep up with your adventures! The last time I went with you and Donald, I nearly-”

“No, no. You don’t need to come with. You remember Webbigail Vanderquack?”

“The crazy girl who’s obsessed with your family history and wouldn’t stop trying to get into the archives?”

“That’s the one,” he chuckled as he turned right to his bedroom. “Is it possible for her to be added to the database for the archives?”

“Sir...that database has every shred of your family history. Are you sure about granting Webbigail access? She isn’t directly related to you and you know that your bloodline isn’t exactly clean.”

“Webby is fascinated with my history and I would be surprised if she didn’t know that my great great great great uncle Francis Duckley was a serial killer. If you add her to it, you won’t have to catalogue every adventure I go on. Webby has a whole journal about every single adventure I’ve been on up to date. She can help you around the archives.”

“Hmmm...I don’t need help running the archives but having an assistant to catalogue your adventures will help immensely. Especially with how often you’re going on trips these days now that Della’s back,” Quackfaster replied, a smile in her voice. “Fine, I’ll add her but it’s your responsibility to make sure she doesn’t abuse the system.”

“Excellent! Now, I must go pack. I’m off to Frenzy Jungle!”

[sophieakatz]

Thursday Thoughts: I Am Proud Of My Fanfiction

The other day, I met with an aspiring creative who wanted to pick my brain about my experiences as a writer. I told her about the plays I worked on in school, the shows I helped bring to life in the Disney Parks, and my novel-in-progress, Tali’s Flowers.

“I haven’t worked on it in a while,” I said. “I love that story, but I keep working on other things instead.”

“Do you not love the other things you’re working on?” she asked me.

The question caught me by surprise, and I laughed a bit – partly because I laugh when I’m surprised, but mostly because the “other things” I keep working on instead of my novel are fanfiction.

You are currently reading this post on my professional writing blog. If you’ve been following me for a while, then you know that I often post links to my fanfiction here. When I first created this blog, I was hesitant to do so. Fanfiction has a reputation of being unprofessional. It’s considered a “lesser” art form to original fiction. I have another Tumblr account for reblogging gifsets and videos and other nerdy, less-than-professional social media things. I considered keeping my fanfiction over there, if I posted it at all.

Ultimately, I decided that this blog is for my writing – all of my writing that I love, that I am proud of, and that I want to share with the world. And that writing includes fanfiction.

Why?

I could say that writing and posting fanfiction is a vital part of my professional development. I spent five incredible months as the Disney Parks Live Entertainment Show Writer Intern, and all the shows I helped bring to life as a part of that internship were, arguably, “official” fanfiction. I was not only assigned but also paid to write new adventures for characters from movies I fell in love with as a child. I put words into the mouths of the Toy Story gang and explored the fan club culture of the world of The Incredibles. Being able to do that again, to make a living writing new stories for characters the world already loves, is one of my career goals.

But that isn’t the whole story. Not everyone who writes fanfiction will ever do so for money, or even wants to. And even if I knew without a doubt that I would never have the chance to write for Disney or any entertainment company ever again, I would still write and post fanfiction.

Because not only do I love writing fanfiction, but I am also proud of my fanfiction.

I am proud of the quality of my fanfiction.

I’m afflicted by the same curse that many writers have: once a story of mine is out in the world, I usually can’t read it again without cringing.

It is a rare delight to write something, return to it a month later, and still like it. This is a natural consequence of improving my craft as a writer, combined with dubiously-healthy doses of anxiety and imposter syndrome.

But there are times, blessed times, when I enjoy rereading my own writing, when I know without a doubt that what I penned was good. I’ve had a lot of those moments while writing fanfiction. Sure, humility is a virtue and putting yourself down is “cool” these days, but I’ve spent years working and learning and improving my craft – I have a Bachelor’s Degree in this, for crying out loud – and it shows!

Lena closed her fingers around the keys, and she put the closed fist to her chest. And all at once it hit her that she was here to stay, and she began to cry. And then Webby was back in front of her, kissing her first on the forehead and then on the beak, and then she threw her arms around Lena’s neck, and Scrooge had a hand on each of their shoulders, and their limbs were good, strong roots that reached so deep into the earth that nothing could ever pull them away, and Lena knew that she was home at last.

The previous paragraph is the final lines of The Sunchaser Grill, a crossover fanfic of Disney’s DuckTales TV show, the 1996 film The Spitfire Grill, and the 2001 Off-Broadway musical adaptation of the same name. And yes, I know how bizarre that sounds. Bizarre stuff happens in this story. But that paragraph is one of my favorite things that I’ve ever written. I am proud to say that whenever I reread it, it makes me smile.

I am proud that my fanfiction comes from a spirit of joy and fun.

There’s a place in the world for sad stories. Sometimes I even write them. But overwhelmingly, my writing steers towards the positive. I write the fics that I write because I know I’ll have a good time writing them.

I wrote Sunchaser Grill because it delighted me how well the characters from one work fit the character roles of the other. I wrote Hang In There because I wanted to imagine the Thirteenth Doctor going back to give a young River Song a bit of hope, in a moment that Doctor Who canon might never give us. I wrote so, so many fics for this last Weblena Month because that little lesbian couple makes me so, so happy. And once, way back in high school, I wrote a 600-word fic about Shere Khan from The Jungle Book meeting Tigger from Winnie the Pooh, just because I thought it would be funny.

I’m proud of the spirit of joy that powers my writing, and I’m proud of the stories that have grown from that joy.

It’s not just about me, though.

I am proud that my fanfiction brings joy to and has meaning for other people.

During my internship with Disney Parks Live Entertainment, I saw children laugh, dance, and play along with the shows I wrote. As that internship neared its end, I naturally felt sad at the thought of not making children laugh with my stories anymore.

Almost on cue, I received an email notification from one of my old accounts. Someone had just left a comment on that “Shere Khan meets Tigger” story I mentioned before. This was in 2018. I wrote that story in 2011.

This is such a perfect crossover! And both tigers are completely in character. Shere Khan is trying to hunt, but gets interrupted by an excited, bouncy Tigger. As a result, Shere Khan is annoyed and Tigger doesn’t let anything bother him.

P.S. My eight-year-old daughter liked it, too.

It hit me then that I had already been creating stories that made children laugh even before Disney hired me, and there was no reason why I had to stop.

I want to tell stories that mean something to other people. Fanfiction has given me the opportunity for that desire to be not just a dream for someday, but something that I can do right here, right now. It’s allowed me to see the impact my writing can have, the impact that I want it to have, on other people’s lives.

Here are a few of the comments that people have left on my fanfiction over the years:

thank you. Just - thank you. And good night; I will finally go to bed, now. – on a Hunger Games fanfic in 2011

An adorable ending to a magical story. I got tears in my eyes, you know, and I almost never cry. :) – on one of my Alice in Wonderland fanfics in 2012

Thank you for giving more depth to an already-amazing character. – on one of my Rune Factory 3 fanfics in 2016

I've been wanting to comment since Chapter One but I couldn't think of something to say. Seeing this story updated just makes my day better and it's so well written and I'm invested in the plot. Just...good job <3. – on that Spitfire Grill fic in 2018

I really love this, it's amazing how you showed the piano and music as something that makes sense in the middle of all confusion and it's amazing to see it as something that can help so much. To me personally piano has been incredibly important so reading this fic just... I have tears in my eyes right now and I don't know how to express how amazing this fic is for me to read. – on one of my Ducktales fics in 2018

This part hit me tbh, this is something I’ve said nearly verbatim when talking about my own fear that no one would ever want to be in a relationship with me… I just want to say how much I love this entire series. – on one of my 2019 Weblena Week fics

People read fanfiction because they want to spend more time with the characters they love, because they want to laugh or cry, because they want to see themselves and their experiences reflected in media. I am proud to create those experiences for other people.

Of course I love the “other things” I keep working on. Of course I love my fanfiction. Someday I’ll finish Tali’s Flowers, or a different novel, or a movie, or a play, and people will call it my “debut” and ask me how it feels to have finally “made it.” And I’ll be proud, of course I’ll be proud. But I’m already proud. I have every reason to be.

[astrodances]

First Night

Back with the next shot of Tales of Gold! This is based on a little headcanon of mine that Scrooge managed to grab a handful of gold in Atlantis to give to the kids after.

Special shout-out to @galoots, whose daily posts and various fics about Scrooge and Donald bonding inspired the latter half of this one-shot. I hope you don’t mind me tagging you, galoots, but your blog is giving me life, and the world needs to know (and follow you for heart-melting fluff).

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy, and thanks for reading!

“What a day” didn’t begin to describe the exhaustion Scrooge was feeling.

In the span of a weekend, he’d met his great-nephews, fought several ancient evils, found the jewel of Atlantis amid a flurry of perils, and one-upped Glomgold. His joints would definitely be feeling this one in the morning.

It felt good, though, especially considering his nephews were moving into the mansion now. He’d miss the type of energy their presence brought, and he was already anticipating future adventures with them all.

As the day wound down, they all sat around the dining room table, eagerly chatting about their adventure and planning out the logistics of living together. The lights were dimmed to a cozy setting, encouraging them all to go to bed but to take their time doing so. Huey, Dewey, Louie, and Webby would all be camping out in the living room that night, since the boys’ room still needed to be set up. Donald would be staying in a guest room for “one night only,” he insisted, just until Launchpad could transport his boat from the marina to Scrooge’s pool.

As tired as they were, no one wanted the night to end.

“Movie nights! Oh, we should have movie nights!” Dewey suggested, sliding a bottle of juice between his palms on the table.

Huey scribbled down his suggestion in the notebook he had in front of him, while Louie added, “Definitely should combine that with pizza night!”

Scrooge smirked at how easily they were integrating their lives into their new surroundings. He bit his tongue to keep himself from adding game nights into the mix, opting instead to bite into the apple pie Mrs. Beakley had made. Even he knew that it was too soon to introduce them to that beast.

By the time Beakley returned to the dining room and announced that she had gathered enough blankets and pillows in the living room for the kids, Scrooge had finished his pie. She picked up his and the others’ plates and disappeared into the kitchen.

As the boys and Webby made to leave the table, he stopped them. There was still one more order of business to attend to.

Standing up with a stretch and taking a few steps towards them, Scrooge gathered them into a circle with a hand around their backs, taking extra notice of the way their eyes sparkled with childlike curiosity. He’d been waiting all day for this moment, but now that it was here, he was glad there were no other adults in the room.

This weekend had been special, no doubt about it. He had his family back in his life, but just as important, they’d gone on their first adventure together. It was something that should’ve happened years ago, a fact that he knew would be haunting him for awhile, but nevertheless, the occasion needed to be marked.

“I’ve got something for the lot of you,” Scrooge began, taking his hand from Webby’s shoulder and reaching into his coat pocket. He pulled out four gold coins and held them in the middle of their huddle, giving them a slight shake to make them glint.

The children gaped in awe, with a sense of familiar excitement overtaking Dewey’s features.

“These coins are from the treasure room of Atlantis. I managed to grab a handful of them on the way out after we got the real jewel, thanks to Dewey here,” Scrooge continued, pausing only to ruffle Dewey’s hair good-heartedly, who pushed him off with a laugh. “It was dangerous and took a lot of unexpected turns, but you all went above and beyond, and should be proud. I know I am.”

Smiling, he plucked the coins from his palm and handed one to each duckling surrounding him.

“A first adventure is something to remember, to cherish,” he ruminated. “It whets the appetite for more, gives you a taste of the thrill. No matter how many we go on, this one will always be special. And that’s why I want you to have these, as a reminder of our first adventure together.”

The kids marveled at the gold in their hands as Scrooge spoke, but when he finished, they collectively launched themselves at him in a group hug, which he heartily returned.

After saying good night, Scrooge ushered the kids out of the dining room and towards the living room so they could go to sleep. As he did so, he caught sight of Donald standing outside by the pool through the window, and remembered the rest of the gold weighing down his pocket.

He still had one more coin to dole out.

The low illumination of garden lights guided his footsteps to the pool, which itself lit up with an ethereal late-night glow. Crickets chirped lazily on the fringes of the courtyard, singing of summers past when his young niece and nephew would go for midnight swims and wake their uncle with their merrymaking, only for him to join them in the end. Afterwards, they would cuddle together at the edge of the pool, their feet dangling in the water, and stargaze while nature played its soundtrack.

The memory stirred a sense of nostalgia in Scrooge as he approached Donald, who now stood alone where they once laid together, his head tilted back towards the stars and the underside of his beak lit up by the pool lights.

"Hey, lad." The gentleness in Scrooge's voice surprised even himself as he joined his nephew. There was ten years of pent-up silence standing between them, something Donald was very clearly still aware of, given how he had yelled at him earlier about the Spear of Selene. But then again, he'd also been on board with the boys moving in afterwards, so that had to count for something. This could go either way.

"Hey," came his answer. Donald sounded more tired than anything, which was understandable, especially considering he'd been with Glomgold for most of the trip to Atlantis.

Scrooge winced at the thought. "I'm sorry my rivalry with Glomgold put you in harm's way. You, and the boys," he said awkwardly before he realized what he was doing.

Donald shrugged. "You got us out of it, didn't you?"

"Heh, I think we both know Dewey deserves the credit there. They all do, actually."

Donald hummed in agreement with the point, and then there was a beat. Their eyes watched the stars through a clear sky, but their hearts strayed to the empty spot on Scrooge's other side, knowing that its usual occupant was lost somewhere far above their heads, a cosmic angel. She would've been proud of this weekend.

"Ye raised them well."

Donald finally turned to Scrooge, stunned. "Huh?"

"The boys, ye raised them well."

Caught off-guard by the sudden compliment, Donald shied into a blush and could only stutter, "I- well- Th-thanks."

Scrooge left it at that, knowing that now wasn't the time nor place to continue that particular conversation, lest they descend into trading verbal punches of blame. It was too soon to risk that. Instead, he latched onto the quiet kindness that had settled between them and changed the subject. "I gave the kids a gold coin each from the treasure room, to mark their first adventure."

Unsure of what kind of response his uncle was looking for, Donald simply asked, "Oh yeah?"

Nodding, Scrooge reached into his pocket and pulled out another coin. "I know it wasn't your first adventure, but...here." He offered the coin to Donald, who took it with a hesitating hand before eyeing it suspiciously.

"What's the catch?" he wondered aloud.

Scrooge laughed and couldn't stop himself from jostling Donald into a one-armed hug against his side. "No catch," he explained. "Just something to remember their- our first adventure together with them."

Donald stiffened in surprise at Scrooge's touch, but gradually melted into the hug, letting his arm stay around his shoulder. He stared at the coin, trying to ignore the feeling in his gut that this was wrong, that Della should be getting this instead, not him. He wrapped his fingers around it and sucked in a breath, vowing that he was accepting it on her behalf. Glancing back up at Scrooge, he whispered, "Thanks, Uncle."

"Don't mention it, laddie."

Together, they looked back up at the sky, watching the twinkling stars for all of four seconds before Donald let out a yawn that he barely caught with the back of his fist to his beak.

Scrooge patted his shoulder with a slight chuckle. "Ye should get some sleep."

"No argument here," Donald agreed as his feet automatically turned towards the mansion. "Good night, Uncle Scrooge."

"Good night, my boy," he returned, watching Donald's figure disappear through the back door. He then turned back to the pool, catching the reflection of the rising half moon against the water before looking up at the satellite itself. The crickets were still chirping and for a moment, he felt the peace that only those lost summer nights could bring.

Sighing in satisfaction, Scrooge reached into his coat once again and let his fingers linger on the two remaining coins within. He took out the one he'd deemed for himself and flipped it in the air with a flourish. The memories of the adventure and the promise of more to come glinted along the gold's edge, causing him to smile.

This was one coin that wasn't going to the Money Bin.

[digikate813]

Fanfiction Writer Appreciation Recs

I’ve seen a bunch of people doing these, and i really wanted to too. I may be late to the party here, but I hope I can point you towards some cool stuff to check out. Most of what I read in the fanfiction circle is Gravity Falls, so this post is mostly just multi chapter fics from the Gravity Falls fandom! I might do one for one-shots, and I’m sorry if I forget any major ones, but this is what immediately comes to mind that I highly recommend.

Stanswap by @orangeoctopi7

Reverse Portal AU at it’s best! The Reverse Portal AU was popular for a while (almost on par with Blind Faith) and a lot of people tried to grab onto the idea, but after all this time, it just seems to have left a lot of incomplete works in it’s wake. That is not the case here. It’s still going, but it shows no sign of stopping until it tells it’s entire story. And this story has been insanely detailed and well executed. Retelling almost the entire series as if Ford was the one taking care of the kids, and the dilemmas he faces with the fact that Stan is stuck on the other side of the portal. Not to mention most of the jokes are on point with something you’d hear in Gravity Falls. The author is someone I am proud to call my friend, and that all started when this fic was recommended to me.

30 Seconds Later by @invisibletinkerer

A pretty recent one that i really hope gets more attention. I’ve seen people do fanart and stuff of Ford being the same age as when he got sucked into the portal, while his home dimension and Stan aged, but I didn’t really see much potential for a full story in that idea. That changes with this fic, which again is still ongoing, but updates fairly regularly. The interactions between the Grunkle Stan we know and love and a Ford who is still fresh from his sleep deprived paranoia days, and still susceptible to Bill’s possession brings so much engaging conflict that i cannot get enough of!

My Demons by @kazriku

An oldie but a goodie. This one is basically a Mystery Trio story that focuses mostly on Stan and Ford, and the first chapter was written before A Tale of Two Stans came out. Adjustments were made after that episode came out, but this fic is very much telling it’s own story on how the Stans became so distant, and the incident that lead to Ford being trapped on the other side of the portal. Filled with mysterious suspense and some entertaining brotherly bonding, even if it hasn’t updated in a while, if we’re talking about fanfics I appreciate, there was no way i couldn’t include this one. It was the first major GF Fanfic I read from the person who would become my first mutual, and chances are this fic lead to me reading all the ones you see here!

By the skin of your teeth by @apathetic-revenant

I didn’t realize just how popular this one was until today, but it deserves it. It’s so good! When Stan gets into his argument with Ford after Ford calls him for the first time in 10 years, he realizes that something's wrong with Ford. He’s very sick and his house is a wreck. There is so much tension and angst in this one as Stan puts the pieces together about what’s been going on with his brother, and Ford continuing to fight what seems like a losing battle. There’s a happy ending, but it takes quite a bit to get there, and it is glorious!

And Then There Were Three by @kalajorn

I’m just going to say it. This is one of my favorite Mystery Trio stories. Ever! With an author who I think really is under the radar in the community. Mystery Trio is probably my favorite AU for Gravity Falls, but depending on who you ask, it either got stronger or weaker once A Tale of Two Stans came out. For me, it only got stronger, and this fic is an excellent example of why. I adore the scenario presented here of how Stan and Ford eventually reunite. How there is some spark of their connection as brothers still there, but there are still forces interfering with that, and using the material from canon to build some great tension. Updates take some time, but i promise you it’s worth it. This story only gets more engaging with each chapter and i’m hoping it’ll stay that way.

A Little Bit Lost by @impishnature

Impish is really a beacon of life for the GF fandom. Regularly producing high quality content of all kinds. I could have put any number of her stories on here. If you miss Gravity Falls, and you want to reminisce about it over a weekend, scroll through her AO3. You’ll find a lot to enjoy. But one of my personal favorites is this compilation of fics surrounding the Feral Ford AU. An AU that vanished as quickly as it arrived. I was even going to write something small on it, but i just never got to it. Anyway, these stories of a paranoid, almost animalistic Ford from what trauma he faced on the other side of the portal is just so powerful. Every idea has a new obstacle. Sometimes it’s comforting. Sometimes it’s heartbreaking. But there’s always something to grab your attention and not let go. I come back to these a lot, and they are always a great read.

I’d also recommend her Mystery Trio fic Phobos, but that one hasn’t updated for a while. But I still really like it so here ya go!

Maybe it’s Not Too Late by @rum-and-shattered-dreams

Why was this one so hard to find? It’s awesome! One of the reasons I’ve dived so deeply into Gravity Falls fanfiction more then any other fandom I’ve been in, is because even after the official shows credits rolled, it still left us with so much potential for what other adventures were out there. And this is one of the best examples of that. It’s a great, insanely engaging post series adventure involving pretty much the entire main cast and the return of the Shapeshifter, with Fiddleford and Ford as the main focus. Yes, it is partly a Ship Fic, which I’m not crazy about, but I don’t really find it distracting. There is so much in this story, and the shipping is just another element of it. And FiddAuthor is one of the ships I tolerate more, so I don’t really mind that much. The rest is just too dang good!!

Better Kept Secret by BadonKaDank

Another one that nearly alluded my radar until a friend mentioned it to me back when it had just completed, and I’m glad they did because this story is AMAZING! Having someone from one of the boys’ past come back for revenge is another premise that was circulating for a while that I freaking adored!! There were a few good pieces of writing out there on this (and even a comic currently going on), but this fic is at the top of the chart for me. Filled with drama, action, intense and suspenseful moments, it’s one that really stuck with me that i can’t believe I almost missed. 

Goodnight Stanley by Kitsunesocks

I haven’t seen many people mention this one, and while it may not be the most angst filled story involving the Stan Bros, it’s still a great one. Without giving too much away, while Stan and Ford are getting ready to head back to Gravity Falls, they discover that Bill might not be entirely gone, and that he may be plotting a way to come back right under their noses. Despite how common it is, this is a premise I’ve never been crazy about. I think @thesnadger Axolotl is the only story like this to engage me past the first chapter. Except this one. This is a great adventure of a story. The pacing is excellent and the characters are on point. Some of the most accurate I think I’ve seen in a Gravity Falls fic. I especially appreciate how proactive Dipper and Mabel are in this story. A lot of fics like this tend to push them to the side to make room for the Stans. But this story makes good use of everyone involved. It’s not the most emotionally driven story out there, but it’s one of the most well put together stories I’ve seen in a GF fic.

Blind Faith by @pinesinthewoods

Oh my God! This one! I originally wasn’t going to include this one because I know the author is no longer active in the fandom, but again, appreciation post. And this story deserves to be appreciated no matter what. You all know this AU, where Stan and Ford both wind up on the other side of the portal, and have to face the horrors on the other side together. Blind Faith was already fairly popular at this point, but this story propelled it to something else. Something stronger. Something with depth. Leaving you with chills as you finish every chapter. Aside from My Demons, this is probably the first fanfic I was checking for updates on, daily. This brought many new ideas to the AU that you still see in the occasional new content today, and that is something truly special. This is from yet another author who I am proud to call a friend, and it’s weird to think that back then, I was just a fan of something a lot of other people were. I’m sure most of you have read this one, but if you haven’t, go read it! It’s one of the best out there.

Stanley McGucket by @thelastspeecher

This is the sort of fic I don’t normally care for. Tons of original characters and a lot of shipping. That’s not a bad thing, it’s just not for me. But the premise was just too intriguing to resist. The idea of Stan being offered a job from Fiddleford’s parents and basically becoming an honorary member of the McGucket family is a really endearing premise. And when certain characters reunite or put the pieces together about who they are to each other, it really gets the ball rolling. You’re just waiting to see how everything will turn out, and it’s a pretty great ride. I followed this story and it’s expansions for a while. Then it branched into multiple AUs on it’s own and it just got way too confusing to keep up with the tag. But the main story is still a enjoyable ride from a type of fic that usually doesn’t grab me. But it had an interesting idea that pulled me in, and followed through on it. Welcome to the McGucket Family Tree Stanley

Amnesia by @ducksalive

Okay, yeah. This one isn’t technically a Gravity Falls fic. But I’m really into Ducktales right now and i was running out of Gravity Falls stories. So yeah, I’ve started diving into Ducktales fan fiction. Even wrote one of my own which you should definitely check out. Please? There’s not much out there that’s grabbed me as much as these other stories yet (if anybody knows any good Fenton Crackshell-Cabrera/Gizmoduck stuff out there, let me know), but something about this one had my attention. 

I’m one of those people who is immediately intrigued by amnesia stories but the reason most people aren’t is because of how often they can go wrong. So far, that’s not the case here. In this story, Donald is the one with amnesia, and Glomgold finds him and convinces him that he’s his uncle, and that Scrooge is the enemy. From there it’s a race to try and help rescue Donald from a trap he doesn’t even know he’s in. While Donald constantly suffers for it. If you’re the type of person who likes family angst (which chances are you do if you’re a fan of any of the above fics) then you’ll get a kick out of this. Every time you think the family is going to get Donald back, Glomgold manages to snatch him away. And realizing just how far he’s willing to go to keep Scrooge’s nephew on his side is just shocking. This is another story that’s still ongoing, so there’s no telling how this will conclude yet, but at the moment, I am very emotionally invested in this one.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve gotten way more into fanfiction then I ever would have imagined. I never looked twice at it before, but now I’ve been a spectator to many creative stories, the authors of some of my favorites have become some of my closest friends, and I’ve even written a couple myself. I may be late to the actual day, but I hope this shows my appreciation for all the fanfic writers above and a few dozen I’m probably forgetting at the moment. 

[thecountsblog]

A Count’s World Retrospective, part 1

You know, working on The Count’s World anniversary has got me thinking about how I got started in fanfiction in the first place. I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned this, but Super Papes wasn’t my first foray into the wonderful world of fanfiction. In fact, I wouldn’t have written TCW at all if I wasn’t already aware of the ff.net community, setup, system, etc. With my 10-year anniversary coming up at the same time the DuckTales reboot is already showing its premier movie and on schedule to launch in about a month, I’m reminded that what really got me into fanficcing was... Darkwing Duck.

The Disney Afternoon aired on TV when I was little, and I have memories of playing at DuckTales and Darkwing with my brother, as well as having toys and storybooks of those series. But, like most things from my childhood, they faded away as I grew older. I have no idea what brought it up, but I didn’t think about Darkwing Duck again until 2006, which is forever known as The Year I Moved to Disney World.

This was a transitional period in my life: I was on my own for the first time, learning how to function with my disabilities, and for the first time doing something I loved in a place I loved and getting paid for it. But still, it was lonely at times. For the first half I didn’t get along with any of my roommates, I had trouble making friends at work, and things were all-around rough.

This coincided with an interesting period in Internet development. 2006 was a unique time in Internet, as it was after the time when having internet access in your home was approaching ubiquitousness, but the structure and scoiety still had that old “wild west” feel. People had things like MySpace, LiveJournal and other platforms for creating content and connecting with like-minded individuals. However, this was all incredibly new and nobody really knew what to make of it yet. The “old fandom,” which I had not taken part in, which was mostly tied to bulletin boards, old terrible fansites, mailing lists, etc., were all falling to the side as things like LiveJournal groups and fanfiction.net began to make it easier to bring fandom together.

Also back then, you couldn’t go online and look up any episode of any cartoon you want on kisscartoon or watchcartoononline. I only had access to a handful of episodes on dailymotion and that’s it. The first DVD hadn’t even been released at the beginning of this escapade. So a google search for Darkwing Duck doesn’t bring up the show’s wiki or its illegal episode torrents. It brings up old fan sites, which later rehosted their works on ff.net where a whole new generation of content creators was using it as a platform to share their works.

So I, being on my own and lonely, began to read. And read. And read. And when I finally made a friend who would watch the show with me on the DVD that came out while I was down there, we speculated. The speculation tied with my new discovery of fanfiction, and I began to write.

None of these works have ever seen the light of day. They have not been published or even finished. One of them is so embarrassing I won’t even tell you what it was about if you begged me, but the other one was something special. It was going to be my magnum opus. For all of 2007, the year I came home and crashed hard, it kept me going. Fanfiction made the post-Best Job Ever blues pass by so much more easily. I was really excited about this being my grand debut on the internet.

However, life had other plans.

My brother got a Wii for Christmas in 2007, and with it Super Paper Mario. I played it and loved it, but what I did not love was the ending. I was so upset that Blumiere and Timpani's ending was so... unsatisfying! They just disappear and that's it? I couldn't even bear to watch the credits, I just went to my room and cried. (The knowledge of the post credits scene helped soothe the burn somewhat, but I still felt cheated.)

Like I did two years previously, I handled the vacant gap with fanfiction. Like before, it fleshed out a world that I wasn't ready to leave. The one that took most of my attention was "Odium and Love," by Lazlo Pizzazzlo (then named Lazlo Titan.) But there were so many good ones. I had already set aside my "Magnum Opus" because I was too removed from the source material to do a good job, so I thought, "Why not write about Super Papes?"

All these ideas came to me: instead of writing one big fix-it fic, I would instead break it down into small, managable chunks. Since I was even back then a huge animation enthusiast, I thought about making it like a Saturday morning cartoon, except with more continuity. I took inspiration from a lot of other sources, which I will dicuss later, weather permitting, but the two shows that had the biggest impact in terms of setting were Aladdin: The Series and All Dogs Go to Heaven: The Series, both TV series that took pace after sequels to great movies that played around with the setting to make the show work. I figured I'd do three, maybe five, and then move on.

I did not expect people to respond as they did. I actually did not expect people to respond at all. I expected my first fics to go unread and unnoticed. But people liked it. And I found that I liked it, too. So I wrote more, and more. Five became nine, which led to a movie, which led to more. I lost steam not too much later, so I started branching out to other fandoms. But every time I thought I'd moved on, I wanted to go back. So I did.

Now here we are, ten years, twentyish shorts and a "movie" later, and I'm still here. I never did finish that debut story, and all my notes on it are long gone. Maybe I'll tackle it someday. Maybe not. Maybe I'll branch out more to other fandoms, or maybe I'll stay here. I never planned for any of this to happen, and I haven't planned for anything after this. But I'm still here, and if you're reading this you are, too. Or maybe you just got here. If so, you're welcome to stay. I appreciate the company. I know I have trouble interacting with my readers, but this is why I got into fanfiction in the first place: because I was lonely, and I liked a thing but there wasn't enough about it.

[ncfan-1]

2018 Fic Retrospective

2018 Fic Retrospective

I’m still doing the thing where, for word count, I calculate word count both from fics written and pieces of meta over 500 words written. Because I did spend a fair amount of time on those meta, and in certain cases, they were the only thing I wrote that day.

Total Number of Completed Stories: 51, and all of them were published to my AO3 this time. 49 of them are finished, while 2 are WIPs, and of the 2 WIPs, you should only look to see one of them finished.

Total Word Count:

For fic: 250,598 words For meta: 105,626 words over 88 meta posts Total: 356,224 words

Fandoms Written In: Star Wars, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: KOTOR II, La Belle et La Bête (2014 film), Beauty and the Beast (Fairy Tale), The Silmarillion, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008), Star Wars: Leia Princess of Alderaan, Star vs. The Forces of Evil, Gotham (Fox), The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth, Herbert West: Reanimator, Chronicles of Narnia, The Children of Húrin, DuckTales (2017), The Magnus Archives, Adventure Time, Within the Wires

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d predicted? More. I set a yearly word goal for myself of 180,000 words (360 days ÷ 500 words), and 250,598 for fic far exceeds that. I wrote a lot (relatively speaking) of 10k+ oneshots this year, and that likely had something to do with it.

What’s your own favorite story of the year?

As usual, I’m doing a top 5 instead of just picking one. These are in no particular order:

1. In Courts of Living Stone: Of course, writing for the Silm crackotp was fun, but there were a lot of other things about this that made it so satisfying to write. Making Menegroth a beautiful and hair-raising Eldritch Location and Melian unsettling (not sinister, just deeply unsettling) were a bit part of it.

2. Is It Gremlins?: I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: There are a weirdly high number of parallels between Sabine and Kallus’s characters, considered they’ve had direct, one-on-one interaction with each other all of once over the course of the series. And there was no fic exploring the potential dynamic they’d have once Kallus defected to the good guys, so I wrote that fic. And it came out… good.

3. No Words Can Express: I actually didn’t expect Roswitha to take off in my head as much as she did; she was originally a less-high strung, more put-together woman, but she was less interesting that way. Sabine originally had more of a presence in the fic than she did. I can’t remember, but I think one of my earliest ideas for the fic might have been to have it from Sabine’s POV instead of Roswitha’s. That would have also been less interesting than the end result.

4. Perilous to Mortals: No one ever explained what happened to the Lesser Rings. Ever. Why not? Well, I did explain (What happened to one of them).

5. A Vicious and Voracious Hunger: Mary Keay was fun to write.

Did you take any writing risks this year? Asides from the typical, low-stakes risks of writing fics for pool noodle ships, fics in tiny fandoms, fics with OCs as the POV character, where the only real stakes present are the possibilities that the fic will just get no exposure? Eh. I am currently writing a novel-length retelling of Beauty and the Beast, so I suppose there’s always the risk that I might not finish it, but right now I’m feeling pretty motivated to finish it.

Do you have any fanfic or ofic goals for the New Year? Finish Face to Face is the first big one. Beyond that, I want 2019 to be the year I well and truly give no fucks and write whatever my heart bids me, no matter how niche, no matter how pool noodle-ish the ship. Even if I am really and truly the one person who has ever had a desire to read a certain fic, I will put it out into the world so that at least I can read it. (Getting into smaller fandoms means having to live with less exposure, anyways.)

My best story of this year: I’m gonna do the same as last year, and pick a fic I liked that didn’t go into my favorite Top 5, since it’s hard to really say which one is undeniably, objectively the best. And the one I’m going with is Bitter Work, aka the one where Maedhros starts to learn how to write with his left hand. I thought it hit the beats it needed to, and that Maedhros and Aredhel’s dynamic carried the story well.

My most popular story of this year: If we’re going by hits, it’s Time to be Spontaneous with 685 hits, and I suspect that’s down more to it being a popular ship like Bubbline than indicative of the quality of the fic, because I consider this one, while okay, not really my best work. It was my first foray into a fandom whose diction I don’t have the strongest grasp of. By kudos and bookmarks, that’s O Heart of Light with 68 kudos and 10 bookmarks (only 5 of which are public) respectively, and this one is more like right, because I do think this was a good fic.

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe: It’s probably not fair to stick one of the ones from a small fandom in here, because they’re going to get less exposure as a rule. With that, I think Tacenda definitely counts. I don’t know if it’s just that people don’t want to read fics where Mical is one of the main characters, but I’d thought this one would get more attention than it did.

Most fun story to write: That’s a tie between In Courts of Living Stone, A Vicious and Voracious Hunter, Perilous to Mortals, and Watcher Of/In the Woods.

Story with the single sexiest moment: Who do you think I am?

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: Results May Vary ended in me thinking that a certain someone is less of a blithe mad scientist than he appears at first glance.

Hardest story to write: Do as the Romans Do gave me rather more trouble than I’d thought it would.

Biggest Disappointment: The Disordered Mind of Doubt wound up being rather less than I’d hoped it would be.

Biggest Surprise: I really didn’t expect Honne to break the 20k mark. Really didn’t expect that.