#fic: an amateur psychic's guide to remembering what was lost

[midrashic]

rules. it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (or so) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought to the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

i was tagged by the amazing lavender-lotion, who has written a ton of wonderful stuff this year! i did look at fics i wrote throughout the year (17!) but my five most recent fics are genuinely what i’m most proud of. i don’t know if that means i’m improving or what, but it’s a good feeling to look back on your work and feel grateful that the output of all that time and effort seems worth it. (no writing is wasted etc. but! some writing is especially not wasted.)

in order, with the fic i’m most proud of coming last:

AN AMATEUR PSYCHIC’S GUIDE TO REMEMBERING WHAT WAS LOST

x-men | cherik | 32k 

Hong Kong, 2011. Erik Lehnsherr lives in limbo: scrounging up money to pay rent from gambling dens or the scrapyard, not using his psychic powers, not dealing with his PTSD. When a teenage fellow psychic shows up at his shithole apartment with a get-rich-quick scheme, he's pulled into a world he thought he left behind—a world of brutal powers, deadly government experiments, and a mysterious man with a suitcase who is going to change his life… again.

for cherik big bang 2020 | this is a fusion with the terrible 2009 chris evans movie push, & it was a lifeline when i was grappling with writing my original idea for the cherik big bang. this is a fun exes-reuniting story about psychics, and i had a great time with the settings, the formal elements, & the way the plot entwined with charles and erik’s relationship.

THE WAY THIRST HOLDS WATER

x-men | erik x hank | 3k

"I'm not hiding," Hank said. Erik laughed, like rusty bells jangling. "McCoy, you're always hiding."

for @librata-laments​‘s birthday and trans appreciation week day one: coming out | smutty pre-cuba plane hatesex featuring trans!erik & trans!hank. this turned out so much better than i expected it would, & i fell in love with this version of erik.

AS CLOSE TO HELL

james bond | 00q | 19k 

O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. —Romeo, Romeo & Juliet I.v.114-115

for the mi6-cafe’s occult october | part ii of conjurings series | i was very proud of the first installment in this series, featuring medium!q & ghost-hunter!james and based off of the conjuring movies; it was also an occult october fic and the first thing i wrote when i really started getting serious about making time for fandom in my life. if possible, i’m even prouder of this one. it’s got epistolary elements, has more of an action plot than its predecessor, & a few tropes that i love, and if the commenters are to be believed, that readers love too.

OTHER FUTURES THAN THESE

x-men | cherik | 81k 

In which Cuba doesn't break them apart, but that doesn't mean that their futures are tied together. (Except that it does.) A Days of Future Past AU where only one person can defeat the Sentinels and save the future: the man whose imprisonment and torture created them, and Charles Xavier's ex.

i will always think of this as my first genuinely long fic. it was also the first i posted on a set schedule, the first fic i wrote out of order, & my first cherik fic. i really enjoy the classic time travel fix-it nature of this fic, and if this remains my most popular cherik fic, i think it’ll be for good reason. just a rock for me throughout this year.

A KRITIK OF PURE REASON (THE SUITS REMIX)

x-men | cherik | 27k | warning: references to child sexual abuse

Texas: When Erik and Charles collide during their senior year of high school, they swiftly find out they make the perfect debate partners. But as secrets come out—and as they draw inexorably closer—more turns out to be at stake than the State championship.

for x-men remix 2020 | i have wanted to write a debate au since i was in the sherlock fandom c. 2013, so actually sitting down and writing it--with inspiration taken from my own cx debate years & ben lerner’s the topeka school--was intimidating, exhiliarting, and ultimately felt so good. the charles & erik that ended up taking form were intense, both in their passion for debate and each other, in a way that really gets to the core of what a lot of people find appealing about high school aus, i think--that feeling that everything matters so much, that feeling of being rubbed raw by the world. 

tagging! @castillon02​, @solarmorrigan​, @ato-the-bean​, @insertmeaningfulusername​, @hellfre​, & @ikeracity​!

[midrashic]

Hi, I wanted to ask you about your cherik fic based on the 2009 movie Push. The villain's name is Esmail Nur. Was he inspired by en sabah nur? I was wondering if there's a particular reason why he has an arab name when there aren't other elements of that culture in the story. Thanks for reading!

yes! he’s not just inspired by apocalypse but intended to be the same character; i thought “en sabah” might stick out as a first name in the 21st century, though, so i updated it. 

[midrashic]

self-rec meme. reply with your favorite five fics that you’ve written, then pass it on to at least five other writers.

tagged by the glorious, the incredible, the inimitable @x-populuxe, whose fics you should check out immediately, starting with their favorites. everytime i see a new populuxe story @ikeracity​ & i throw a little party on discord. my examples are not so illustrious & also come embarrassingly close to the meme i did in 2021 about the fics i was proudest of having written in 2020! but here they are regardless.

KATABASIS

supernatural | destiel | 47k

Fortunately for the newly-condemned Dean Winchester, there's more than one way to resurrect an angel. Love, hell, and other myths.

originally for 2016 deancas reverse bang | this still might be my magnum opus, actually. it was my first moderately long fic, took me two years to finish (obviously, it did not get posted for the reverse bang), & gave me fits, & i still love what i did with the symbolism, the many layers of references, & dean’s voice. too bad none of my friends will touch supernatural with a ten-foot pole 😢 i mean. not that i blame them.

THE LAST LOVE SONG & TESTAMENT OF CHARLES F. XAVIER

x-men | cherik | 20k

When Erik is accused of domestic terrorism, Charles has no choice but to marry him to keep him out of jail.

for cherik week 2020 | actually i was on the fence about this one! ike almost had to bully me into picking a fifth fic at all, even though i felt the top tier of my fics was really only represented by four. then i remembered that erik likes starbucks pink drinks & count chocula cereal in this fic and was like. you know what? you did a good job with this.

A KRITIK OF PURE REASON

x-men | cherik | 27k

Texas: When Erik and Charles collide during their senior year of high school, they swiftly find out they make the perfect debate partners. But as secrets come out—and as they draw inexorably closer—more turns out to be at stake than the State championship.

for x-men remix 2020 | i’ve wanted to write a debate au since 2014, which i know because that’s when sherlock s3 aired & my first version of this plot was with sherlock & john. policy debate is--difficult--to explain to people who didn’t debate; it’s not so much debate as it is a highly ordered logic game, something rather like verbal chess--obviously charles & erik would’ve loved it. i’m extremely proud of all the comments that said that i somehow managed to make it comprehensible (with thanks to ben lerner, who also did policy debate in high school, & whose book the topeka school, in which he described spreading at the time of its invention, convinced me it was not in fact impossible to describe adequately), but what i really love about this fic is that it’s so! nostalgic! i poured the best parts of my adolescence into this fic & rereading it is reliving it.

AN AMATEUR PSYCHIC’S GUIDE TO REMEMBERING WHAT WAS LOST

x-men | cherik | 32k

Hong Kong, 2011. Erik Lehnsherr lives in limbo: scrounging up money to pay rent from gambling dens or the scrapyard, not using his psychic powers, not dealing with his PTSD. When a teenage fellow psychic shows up at his shithole apartment with a get-rich-quick scheme, he's pulled into a world he thought he left behind—a world of brutal powers, deadly government experiments, and a mysterious man with a suitcase who is going to change his life… again.

for cherik big bang 2020 | for a fusion with the terrible 2009 chris evans movie push, this still holds up! i keep going back to this again & again despite it being one of my least popular with the masses. i ended up really loving some of the side characters that i don’t normally play with, like irene & daken, and erik’s flashback to his romance with charles is one of my favorite portraits of a romance i’ve ever written. this was the last really action-packed thing i wrote, & i forgot how much i loved doing the pacing & the scene headings. i’ve gotta get back to long fics soon!

AS CLOSE TO HELL

james bond (craig movies) | 00q | 19k

O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. —Romeo, Romeo & Juliet I.v.114-115 Or: Another day, another haunted house. But this time, it's James's.

for 007fest 2020 | a month ago, i don’t know if any james bond fic would’ve made this list, but honestly, the epistolary elements--as close as i’ve ever gotten (so far!) to writing the epistolary fic of my dreams--& a few of the lines from the final confrontation are, i think, some of my best! also, solomon the ghost cat: best oc of all time? perhaps.

tagging! @ikeracity, @insertmeaningfulusername, @castillon02, @redring91, & @lavender-lotion.