#im also 99% sure gabriel ultrakill and gabriel mandelacatalogue are the same guy

[rainbowgod666]

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I think I've figured out a good way to articulate one of the reasons Human Domestication Guide is hitting for me in a way really not much else has done for a long time.

HDG is an inverse fandom.

Whereas a lot of fanfiction (maybe just for the sake of the pun we can expand outwards, wink, and call them "transformative works") takes at the core of its nature a specific character or group of characters, and then transplants (sorry, I had to) those characters into Alternate Universes in order to keep telling altered, revised, and original stories with those CHARACTERS, while changing everything else, HDG does the opposite.

It takes the SETTING as the core defining feature, and creates original CHARACTERS in order to tell original stories.

And that's really cool for reasons that, of course, ended up becoming another gigantic one of Amy's Patented Infodump Posts.

Most fanfiction gets to appeal to its audience because of the associations and attachments readers have for the CHARACTERS, and then create a new story from there without having to spend time setting up WHO THE STORY IS ABOUT for you. I don't say this as a bad thing, that's just the attraction. The readers bring their attachment to the characters WITH them before they start reading.

HDG gets to assume you understand the SETTING as a basic premise, and then tell new stories with original characters without having to hold your hand through as much of the set up work, because you already know the SETTING going in.

So instead of discovering how the characters you know relate to a world you don't (and to each other within that context), you get stories where you get to discover who the characters ARE, in the context of a world you already understand.

It's not "what does a different setting do to these characters." It's "how do different people navigate this setting."

You get to meet and learn and identify with the CHARACTERS because you see how they as unique people react to a set premise.

So much of what I've read so far has done exceptional work establishing who the characters are, even making MINOR characters within the story feel like fleshed out people.

You'd think in a setting that takes at face value the premise of humanity being subjugated and doted on by a species that uses mind control drugs to turn them into docile, obedient pets, the stories would struggle a bit with sameness as the individuality of the characters failed to shine through or were inevitably suppressed over the course of the plot.

In practice, it seems like almost the OPPOSITE is true.

The Affini always win. But every character chooses to lose to them in a different way that speaks to who they are as people.

Getting to explore these unique stories through the eyes of unique characters seems like it's making it EASIER to latch on to what makes THESE characters the focus of the stories being told.

And so far the stories being told are fucking great, and have such a huge range to them.

The original story for the setting is a VERY non consensual medfet/drug play subjugation story where Elvira (captain of a ship for the Free Terran feralist rebellion) is ABSOLUTELY brought into domestication by force (at first), and we get to see the PROCESS of her being broken down and becoming something new over the course of (what we later learn has been ONLY) about three weeks. She's not the same person she was at the start of the story. At all. She's been utterly replaced by a new identity and personality that the old version of her would never have accepted. (Also it's kinda hot that it's actually good for her, and that she very much DOES end up happier for it. She's still Elvira. But she's safe, and she's loved.)

That's a pretty specific vibe for a story.

But the next story I read in the setting takes place over the course of several hours in-universe, and basically follows a dysfunctional, clearly neurodivergent woman stagnating in the limbo of having been failed by capitalism (or in her mind, failing at it) and having mixed feelings about the staggeringly powerful alien civilization that is currently part way through conquering her planet and its people.

The story starts off when she's so hungry after scraping through what scant, nutritionless garbage she was able to find in the capitalist dystopia that it finally overrides her fear, and she goes to the border of Affini-controlled territory in her city. She figures, they're going to do whatever they're going to do to the rest of the city within a few days anyway, so there's no sense pretending whatever outcome she's walking into wasn't inevitable, and even if it's not as good as the Affini promise, at least it's not what she's been stuck in. Fear of sameness finally becomes more traumatic than fear of change.

She proceeds to go on an adorable lesbian grocery date with a 10 foot tall plant that gently flirts with her while remaining very firm that all of this human's needs CAN and SHOULD and WILL be taken care of FOR her from now on, and it's OKAY that she has trouble focusing because it's OKAY that some people need more help than others.

She spends several chapters experiencing repeated Lesbian Bluescreens because of this sweet, doting alien who insists it's no trouble at all and she's happy to help. Then said alien takes her back to her apartment on the human side to make sure she feels safe getting there through the anti-Affini protests, and then in a matter of minutes she has cleaned this girl's entire disaster of an apartment and promised to cook her a nice Terran pizza.

Then the girl has a lesbian panic attack while coming to terms with how much misery she didn't have to be living with, and whether this future isn't exactly what she always hoped for and more, so the alien offers to give her some alien drugs to calm her down, and her now fuzzy brain accidentally crumbles under the weight of all the secret petplay fantasies that have been turning her face red all morning and she accidentally calls the alien "Mistress", and then she goes home to THEIR place back in Affini territory with her new owner and gets absolutely spoiled until she falls asleep feeling safe and loved for the first time in her life.

COMPLETE tonal shift from the original story, but the LOGIC of the story is fully consistent with the setting. It's just a different character responding to that setting in a different way.

The range of what's possible is ENORMOUS.

I went from there to "two humans captured at different times struggle to find their way back to each other and end up with neural implants plugged into each other's brains by their shared Mistress, and the feedback loop helps them domesticate EACH OTHER" and then from there to a mostly historical context story about an Affini who lived for almost 300,000 years and how she feels about the Compact's role in everything they've done to the universe.

And then I got to read "I have to pretend to be a good little floret maid at an Affini Compact hotel because that's my Genius Spy Cover WHOOPS it turns out being a maid means getting teased and played with a lot WHOOPS, OHHhhh NOOOoo~ I'VE BEEN TURNED INTO A FREE USE HYPNO DOLL because EVERYONE KNEW I WAS A SPY THE WHOLE TIME, I'm going to resolve my mixed feelings by erotically betraying my co-conspirator so we can be floret girlfriends together," which was cute, funny, and INCREDIBLY hot.

Seriously, chapter 10 of that story. Holy FUCK. I think my brain has turned fully inside out. I had a DREAM kinda like it afterwards that I wish I could remember more of.

I guess my point is HDG is less like a fandom and more like DND.

It's a shared universe of collaborative storytelling, even if any individual work within it was made by one person.

You get to play within a core set of rules for how the setting works, but the stories that can come out of playing by those rules are so incredible and diverse and interesting, and I'm really enjoying getting to explore all of that within the context of a basic premise that has absolutely grabbed most of my kinks by the throat, stared menacingly into my eyes, and smirked knowingly.

Also it's INCREDIBLY queer and very obviously made specifically for gay autistic trans women who take progesterone, so I guess just like the rest of the little Terrans, I never stood a chance.