As I get used to the idea of being a writer, slowly and hesitantly and with a giggle of self-doubt, I find myself disappointed. And, much like all disappointment, I really wish I didn’t.

I write fanfiction. I love writing fanfiction. I write original stories, I plan out webcomics full of original characters, I write autobiographical essays, and I write things like this where it’s just lipservice (wordservice?) for me to air out my problems or issues or even happiness.

I don’t understand why fanart is held on such a different level than fanfiction. I don’t understand why there can be movements of art galleries of fanart that are seen as a benefit to the show and a way for the fans to converge, yet putting out a magazine (even where all profits go to the show or to charity) of fanfiction is not only illegal but also probably not going to gather nearly enough interest.

I appreciate art. I do it myself. I know how hard it is to do, to do right, to do in a satisfying way. I know how much time it takes to get something perfect, and I know how you can sell fanart at conventions for profit from your hard work.

So why isn’t fanfiction the same? Is it any harder to find that one perfect, poignant line to tie your piece together than it is to choose the color palate that will give your drawing a drastically different feeling? Is it any different to spend hours thinking of the right word, the right paragraph, the right idea and how to express it than to sketch and sketch and sketch until you finally have the right line work? Or to think of the perfect opening sentence to draw people in, to entice them to keep going, because as a writer you need the reader to want to invest in your work, not just money, but a chunk of time. Is it any different to pour my feelings out through a pen and keystrokes and a collection of words, a frame of a story or an apt metaphor or a new combination of unlikely words, than to pick up a brush or a pencil and draw until I feel satisfied?

It upsets me that it’s not as easy for fanfiction authors to profit from their hours of hard work. That we can’t just sell a book of short fanfictions the way an artist can sell an art book of fanart sketches. That we can’t sell original drafts or printed copies of a story the way artists sell a single sketch or commission? Why is it so odd for me to think of commissioning a writer to write something for me? Why is it a foreign thought?

It feels like there’s a disconnect where one is inclined to say something like “well, this style of art is only something so-and-so can do”. But it’s not. Pick up any book in my library, read one page from it and I will tell you who wrote it. Writing styles and quality writers are just as unique as artists, and yet there is this disconnect in the rules of how writers are able to show appreciation for their fandoms. How they can’t profit off of it. And I don’t mean just monetary profit, I mean recognition, appreciation, relationship with the fandom. Pick a fandom, and name your favourite authors and your favourite fanartists. Unless you’re an author for the fandom yourself, I bet the artist list is significantly longer.

I don’t understand it, and no one has been able to give me a clear answer I can’t refute. I don’t like it, because this stigma and the way writing and fanfiction is treated, not just within the fan community, but also by the world at large, makes me feel shame every time I talk about something I truly love to do, something I’m so glad I’m inspired to do.

What’s the difference between a fan comic of a series or a book or a movie, bound and sold as an art book or a short comic or whatever, and a novella or a collection of short stories inspired or based on that book or movie or series?

More importantly, why is there a difference?

As they landed for their weekly training mission planet-side, Carolina looked around at her troops and said over the radio, “did that ride seem a little…bumpy to you?”

Connie laughed from across the airplane. Carolina’s helmet snapped towards her with a warning, and South just shrugged and said, “who cares, we’re here.” Carolina sighed and didn’t pursue it.

“Alright, it’s a simple scout and recovery mission in an enemy base,” Carolina said, standing up and leading by example as she lined up at the door, waiting for it to open. “Standard teams, standard practice. Maine, you’re with me and York.”

“Growl. Woof,” Maine said, and Carolina stared at him, hard.

“I think he’s got a cold,” York said next to her in explanation and she shrugged it off as just one more weird thing to her day so far.

“Right. Whatever, you’re good for this mission?” Maine nodded, tersely like he always does, and she sighed. It’s a wonder anything goes smoothly with this team. Ever.

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Wyoming wondered if his enhancement, his time dilation was intentional, some kind of cruel poetry at gaining a second chance at life without ever really offering a second chance at anything else that might matter. He wondered because of how the Director banned him from the recovery missions for CT, banned him but kept Wash, subtly moved him around so the others didn’t question, gave him conflicting missions at the same time on a completely different part of the planet, made it impossible for Wyoming to be in the same space as her again after she left.

He stopped wondering, his suspicions confirmed, when the Director cleared him for in-field enhancement use and added, quietly, “it can’t give you a second chance at past regrets.”

“Yes… yes. This is a fertile land, and we will thrive. We will rule over all this land, and we will call it… This Land.” The hands, sadly devoid of dinosaurs, moved over the console as if they held those sacred children’s toys all the same. The voice changed, became more hoarse, and the speaker went on. “I think we should call it… your grave!”

“What are you doing?” a woman’s voice said behind him with such ferocity that Wash jumped in his seat. He carefully swiveled the chair around to discover Four-Seven-Niner, leaning in the door frame, glaring.

“How did you-” he started, unsure how her metal armored boots were so unbelievably silent in the empty Pelican hull. “I was just-“

“You are sitting in my chair.”

Wash looked down at the offending piece of furniture. “I guess,” he admitted slowly.

“You are in the hangar bay after hours, in the Pelican unsupervised, in my cockpit, sitting in my chair.” Her voice got louder with every point and Wash’s wincing had achieved full-body status by the end. He was cowering from her on the edge of the seat. She hadn’t moved any closer to him, just leaned in a little from her position by the door. “I never took you for a rule breaker, and I definitely didn’t think you were this amount of crazy, stupidly suicidal.”

“I-I’m sorry,” he scrambled, his heart still racing.

“Just get out of here, Agent Washington,” she said with a heavy sigh. He scurried out of the chair, turning it around to its original position, and shrank into the wall as he tried to walk past her while also being as far away from her as possible. She let him pass, turning to stare at him as he walked.

Wash reached the doors at the end of the ship and allowed himself the deep breath he had been holding.

Niner’s voice rang out as the door was closing behind him. “And curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!”

“There must have been a trick to it,” he kept saying. He had been pulling on the little trap door for ten minutes now, and it wasn’t budging one bit. Rapunzel had tried to help, then just sat back and watched intently, and now she was staring out the window, not even paying him any attention.

“Forget it,” she finally said. Eugene paused in his struggles and frowned.

“So, what, we climb back down the tower?” He hadn’t taken his arrows with him this time, and the sharpest things here were kitchen knives and that dagger that he was pointedly avoiding.

Rapunzel just nodded. “The old way,” she said, as if it explained everything. She was holding on to the long, winding streak of brown hair that littered the room.

“Oh,” was all Eugene could think of to say. “But, it’s not… I mean, before, yeah, you could do a lot with it, but it was magic, right?”

Rapunzel didn’t say anything as she went around the room to find the start of her hair, and tied it securely to the stairs. She then walked over and hung it on the hook she had always used. Finally, without turning around, she responded. “You’re right. We should go down together, the quicker the better.” She waited for him to walk over to the window. It took him a moment as he went to inspect the knot and how strong it was, then carefully made his way over. He craned his neck to see her face. She wasn’t crying, or looking upset. She just looked serene. Almost at peace.

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rtficandarttrade:

By: Reeberry
For: Timelessalice
Characters: Wash, CT, York, Carolina, Church, Tex
Summary: There’s only one relationship Wash can really think of where it was just…right.

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Rebageling (BEST. WORD.) because yeah, it’s nice to have all my fics under smei-haphazardly organized tags :)

Doc didn’t have a problem with admitting he wasn’t very good at keeping people alive.

He knew the reds and blues laughed at him while they fought their tiny war. He could even joke about it too. Yeah, I went to an out-of-country beach college. Well, I’m not technically a doctor, you have to pass the MCATs for that. Oh, no, you should call me a medic.

He didn’t really bother to protest too much when they nicknamed him “Doc”, though.

Because medic or paramedic or creepy shaman medicine man, it didn’t matter what he actually was. It didn’t matter that he gave lotion for just about every combat injury, or that his only diagnose tool didn’t differentiate between the minute shades of green in any significant manner. What did matter, what had always mattered, was a show about doctors he saw when he was very young.

His parents had been fast asleep and he had carefully and quietly tip-toed past their room to watch something. He was way too young, so naturally he gravitated towards the Grown Up channels.

He saw a show.

It was a messy show, and very, very old. There were doctors and they looked like regular people - not overly pretty, not overly thin - just people. One of them was bald. It was a show about how they helped people. How they healed them, even if they couldn’t heal themselves. It was a show about doing the right thing, being the right person, living up to a standard, being a doctor.

It was a show he would sneak out of bed for, watch in the early hours of the morning, never mention it to his parents. Never say how the bald doctor is why he wants to go to med school. Let his long legs swing uncertainly under his chair as he told his parents that the army would pay for his schooling. Pulled at his shirt sleeves as he told them he failed the exams for all the schools close by to them. Cried as he boarded his plane to education, leaving them behind.

He got here, to the bases, tired and hungry and medic - not doctor. It was still three bases before “Doc” would become his official name.

Three bases of people dying.

Three bases of him playing operation and failing.

Three bases of thinking back to those nights, long ago. To those tv doctors who stacked up complicated procedures like score cards. To those mentors.

He couldn’t help but notice that he was failing even that show, that motivation. He was supposed to be better. He was supposed to be able to do something, to help them, to teach others to help themselves, he was supposed to be a doctor. He was supposed to, what’s the line? “Do one, teach one, kill one.”

He had the last part down.

Even through all of Blood Gulch, he was still just working on the first two.

But he liked it there anyway.

He liked that the people here called him Doc, even if they didn’t like him. He liked that for all their insults, they still seemed to care on some level. He liked that he could just hang out with them.

He liked that no one ever seemed to die.

“How come you get to be Captain America?”

North looked up at Wyoming with a sigh and a small smirk. “Well, for starters, I’m American.”

“That’s just my point,” Wyoming explained. “Where’s the irony?”

“Shut up, Spidey,” York called out while he was buckling in his helmet. “You’re supposed to be a snarky teenager, not a whiny one.” That shut Wyoming up and with a click, the final piece of York’s armor was on.

“Everyone ready?” he asked, as those around him nodded.

“Are you sure it’s not breaking protocol…” Wash started, quietly trailing off as everyone in the locker room turned to stare at him. “Nevermind,” he finally conceded, and followed everyone else to the practice field.

Carolina, Connie and South were all waiting for them as they walked out. Every muscle in Carolina’s body hammered in the fact that her patience had long ago left, and what the hell were they doing in the locker room for that long anyway?

“You’re late,” she said.

“It’s a training simulation, Carolina. And you said we needed to be here fifteen minutes early. We’re late to being early. By three minutes.” York said this easily, like he said everything. Carolina’s stance didn’t change, but she didn’t chew him out like she would have if anyone else had said that to her.

“Right. Let’s go.”

They filed off, North jogging up to keep pace with his sister, Connie waiting out the line of people until she could walk next to Wash. “What took you guys so long?” she said.

Wash stumbled over his first word and Connie immediately knew that something was up. “We were changing, Connie, takes longer when it’s crowded.” He looked over at the team, at Wyoming and Maine, walking in silence. North and South, North making some kind of a joke and South completely ignoring it (Wash had grown accustomed to North’s humor hand gestures), York walking with a slightly out of place spring in his step behind the ever-serious Carolina. “Here we go,” he mumbled as the arena opened to them.

Three seconds in and York turned with a nod to North, and Wash knew the two freelancers would be grinning like kids in a candy store under their helmets. “Yo, Captain America,” York said, causing Carolina to snap her head and look at him. “Flank left with me behind that pillar.”

North was already moving. “Sure thing, Superman.”

“Super-Captain-what?” Carolina said, for a moment turning her head to follow their retreating bodies in confusion.

“Hulk,” Wyoming said with a nod to Maine. “Time to move.”

South’s voice came over the radio clearly with a disbelieving, “are you dorks actually using superhero code names?”

“What’s yours?” Connie quickly asked Wash.

“He’s got a code name already,” Carolina said, her impatience in her voice. “It’s Agent Washington.”

“Nightwing,” Wash said, and he felt Carolina’s stare on the back of his head as he rushed past her.

The three women stood, watching and providing cover as their radios chattered with commands barked at “Spiderman”, or “Hulk” and as the guys responded to these names just as quickly and easily as they took to “Wyoming” and “Maine”.

“Do you think I’d be Wonder Woman?” Connie said softly over her radio. South gave her a look through her helmet.

“Who the fuck is that?” she spat, turning her attention back to the simulation battle. 

“I think you’d be Connie,” Carolina said firmly.

“Yeah, but,” she said, biting her lip, trying to stop herself from arguing with Carolina during a battle even if it was about something completely unrelated, even if she was carrying her weight just fine. She’d never hear the end of it.

North answered her question when he passed her at a run, closing in on a cluster of “enemy” soldiers, with an out of breath, “hey, Wonder Woman, you coming?”

She’d never tell Carolina or South about the smile on her face as she followed Captain America into battle.

Angels are not born with mercy.

Otherwise, how could we watch as two boys grow up, again and again, knowing they live only as shadow puppets of the original brothers, and are doomed to their fate as well.

Angels are not taught morals.

Otherwise, how can we groom a man, watching as he nearly kills himself, over and over, to save the one we know he’s destined to kill. He dies and we bring him back. He goes to hell, and we bring him back. To save his brother, until his own hands are the ones who kill him.

Angels are not raised with love.

Otherwise they would understand how these two boys put each other’s welfare above everything, above saving others, above the greater good, above the apocalypse, above man, demon, angel and god.

What angels understand is devotion.

What angels don’t understand, not really, is family.

When they look at the two boys, angels see devotion and loyalty. Angels see strength of character. Angels see two brothers, two vessels, two perfectly poised pieces in the grand scheme of things. They don’t understand love, morals, mercy. They understand following orders. They see the two brothers and they see Cain and Abel, they see servants of the divine plan, they see destiny.

When I look at the two boys, I see family.

So I don’t actually ship Destiel

But if I did..

and if I had just watched Free To Be You and Me…

and if I had a bit of time on my hands and an urge to write Cas…

well…

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“What are you doing?” Wash demanded. He had opened the door to his room and the sight of York eagerly pushing all of the furniture in the room aside greeted him.

“Oh, good, you’re here. I need help, can you grab the other side of the bed?” York said with a grin and motioned to Wash’s bed.

“What? No!” Wash said, stepping in the room and being more confused by the second. York gave him an exasperated look and pointed at the bed.

“Come on, Wash, I promise it’s for a good cause.”

“Yes, exactly, what cause?” Wash crossed his arms, leaning back as York piled his nightstand on the top of his dresser.

“Fellowship. Camaraderie. The greater good, Wash.” He stopped, waiting for the other freelancer to help out with the one bit of furniture that has not yet been moved. The beds.

“I don’t see how moving all our furniture to the walls can be for the ‘greater good’,” Wash said but did it anyway because York had that little kid look in his eyes and that was never a bad thing.

By the time they had lifted Wash’s mattress and frame and positioned it carefully against the wall, Maine had walked over from his room, put down the bag he carried in through their open door and had just finished doing the same to York’s bed.

“Oh, cool, you got the rails?” York said when he turned around at the sound of the mattress gently hitting the wall. Maine nodded. “Thanks, man.” York walked over to the bag Maine had carried in and opened it eagerly, rummaging through it and taking out small railroad tracks.

Wash was starting to get where this is going.

His suspicions were confirmed when North walked in with a smile and a nod to the others, carrying a bag of small train cars. “HO scale, right?” he said towards York, who nodded and continued to carefully lay train tracks on the ground. 

“Wait,” Wash said, and it was only after everyone looked up at him that he realized he said it quite loudly. “Wait, the ‘greater good’ is model train sets?” It seemed a stupid question while he was saying it, even stupider now that it had left his mouth and the other three were giving him that look.

“Yes,” Maine grunted.

“Of course,” North said with a shrug and continued to lay the cars on the tracks and push them together until they linked.

“What else would it be?” York said simply. He handed one of his locomotives to North, every gesture telling the other freelancer that this train was worth as much, if not more, to York than North’s health.

Wash smiled. Of course. “Nothing, you’re right,” he said with an amused shake of his head.

“I know I am, Wash,” York said with a wink. “Now come on, we can use some field manuals to make a tunnel in the middle so we can make the tracks into a figure eight.”

He heard her at night sometimes. Tucker had been the first to mention it. He had called it “praying”. Wash knew Carolina didn’t pray.

She talked.

He felt bad eavesdropping the first few times. Actually, the very first time, he swore she was actually talking with someone. It was only after she mentioned the name - “York” - that he knew she was simply talking to herself.

“Does it help?” he asked her one morning. She looked at him, quiet, and waited for him to elaborate. “I hear you sometimes,” he said eventually. “At night.”

“I didn’t know I was that loud.”

“You’re not. I just walk around a lot.”

“Not sleeping?” she said, even though she already knew the answer.

“Does it help?” he asked again.

“It hasn’t hurt,” she said softly. “For years. It hasn’t hurt.”

In the night, her voice was carried through the air as she talked to a name, a memory of a person, she told York everything. She told him about her good days. About the things that made her laugh. She cried and told him when she had bad ones. And in a few weeks, she heard Wash, too. He still walked around, and she caught bits and pieces as he walked past her door, she caught a name - “Connie”.

Another week later, she could hear Wash snoring again.

“Simmons?” Grif knew what was happening. It’s not like it was rare. He turned the corner and saw the man cradling his right fist in his left hand. “You know, it’s getting kind of expensive to replace that mirror.”

“Just leave me alone,” Simmons said tiredly, not even bothering to look up. He flexed his bloody hand, inspecting the knuckles.

“Seriously, man,” Grif said, walking into the bathroom and leaning against the door. “What’s up with you?” It was like clockwork. Once a week, usually Wednesday, he’d hear him. Simmons. Hitting the mirror. Every once in a while, he hit it hard enough to break it. Grif had asked him about it before.

But this was the first time Grif wasn’t going to take “I don’t want to talk about it”, or “go away”, or anything like that. Simmons sighed but didn’t say anything more. He just continued to inspect his hand.

“Is it broken?” Grif asked after a few minutes.

“It’s robotic.”

“So I guess not.”

“No, I guess not.” He dropped his hands to either side of the sink and let his head fall against the cracked mirror. “I’m not me, Grif.”

“No shit, I‘m you. Most of you.” Grif looked at the man again with a frown. “Apparently all the fun bits.”

Simmons cracked a small smile. “That’s the point, isn’t it. I’m not me, and if I’m not me…”

“Simmons,” Grif said, clapping a hand to the man’s back. “I have faith in you, man. It’s going to take a lot more than a few robot parts to make you not the annoying know-it-all I know and love.”

“Know and what?”

“Know and tolerate,” Grif said, not missing a beat. “What’d you think I said?”

Simmons looked at him, smiling after a moment. “Nothing. Let’s get out of here, we have to report soon.”

“Hey, Simmons?” Grif said as they were walking out. “If that’s your robot hand, why is it bleeding?”

“Sarge put in pockets of red paint,” Simmons said with a shrug. “Apparently he wants to make my eventual death in battle as authentic as possible.”

“Are-are you happy?”

It was a stupid question. Topher knew it was right away. The moment he locked eyes with her, and she smiled at him, he knew it was a stupid question.

“Of course. I’m going to go swim in the pool.”

“And that makes you happy?”

The smile became slightly puzzled. “Of course,” Tango repeated, entertaining the man. He sighed and waved her off toward the pool, and she glided along in that special way that all the dolls do. Sighing, he brought his hands up and behind his head, looking around at the other dolls. There’s Sierra. Holding hands with…who else. Victor. Love. He wondered why no one else had noticed them yet. Or maybe they had? Was love something Attic-worthy?

That didn’t matter. What did matter was that he was down here asking Actives about their feelings when he was already behind schedule due to Sierra’s….thing. But Ivy was there and she stepped in and did a few imprints. He told her he went off to sleep, but he found he just couldn’t. He could still smell it. The blood. Acid. Hear the fizz. See it, all of it.

And there was Sierra, who did it. Who killed someone. Blissful. Happy. In love.

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