My first cliche_bingo fic, for "rare pairings". Stretching the prompt a bit, because some of these aren't rare, but some of them probably are? Warnings for more cliches, pure crack, and, er, other things.

I've had this one in mind for a while, because let's face it, it's fun to pick on poor McGee.

NCIS: 5 Nights McGee Can't Forget {~4,800 words}
PG-13; het, slash; humor, crack
This isn't the first time Tim's had this dream...

( He has to admit, it was one of the more memorable variations. )

So here is my card for cliche_bingo 2009 - let's see how this goes!

( my card )

Regarding Torchwood: Children of Earth: Um. I don't know. Ask me later.

For now, a drabble. Jack Harkness, post-CoE, so spoilers (if oblique ones).

( The Limits of Infinity )

So mfuwss is holding a Bulwer-Lytton style worst-opening-sentences challenge, and since I cannot resist any excuse to extrude outrageous purple prose:

Illuminating was the day when Napoleon Solo's milk-chocolate-hued orbs did happen to lift from the blizzard-like expanse of paradoxically white red-tape covering his desk, and fell upon the pulse-pounding vision of Janet St. Claude, his most recent flame in a libidinous and continent-spanning candelabra, with her lithe arms encircling the sable-suited shoulders of Illya Kuryakin, his steadfast partner in profession and comradeship alike, and also, so the surprising stab of jealousy's searing hot poker occasioned Napoleon to realize at this singular instant, his one and only true love--excepting, of course, his still-mourned wife, the tragically married Clara, that THRUSH scientist chick who (it occurred to him in passing) he'd quite forgotten the name of, even as she had forgotten everything but his own name; and perhaps a dozen other women and a couple men of unsurpassed fairness and virtue--but really, the important thing was the unexpected epiphany that he wanted in Mr. Kuryakin's off-the-rack but oddly flattering trousers at the nearest possible opportunity, and Miss St. Claude would have to wait (until tomorrow morning at the very least.)

OTW announced the preliminary stages of an archived zine collection: The Fan Culture Preservation Project. To me this sounds incredibly awesome - it's not a zine lending library (which I'd really love) but it's a chance for older zines to survive for future fans. Considering my current beloved MUNCLE has some 40 years of fic, but the vast majority of it is only available in zines, and the earliest of that has pretty much vanished without a trace...yeah, awesome!

Reading the comments on the posts, however, it seems like a few ziners (er, if that's the term?) are really distressed by the project's existence. ( trying (and failing) to get a handle on this )

Just signed up for the new multi-fandom fic-writing challenge, cliche_bingo - like Kink Bingo for the kink-impaired. Yay, cliches! If you've been looking for fic inspiration, come join in! Should be fun. *crosses fingers for h/c prompts*

Also wrote a few 6-word MUNCLE fics. Those are as addictive as drabbling!

Now, back to ficcing. (...would anyone out there be interested in cheerleading a WiP MUNCLE angst-fic?)

So the Quest for more David McCallum has lead us from Sapphire & Steel (worth watching - check out this non-spoilery picspam for more details. Now I'm trying out the radio plays, even if they are sadly McCallum-less - David Warner does a bang-up job as Steel, though, and I do like his voice) to Colditz and the '70s Invisible Man TV show.

Colditz is a '70s BBC two-series show about a WWII POW camp, mostly adapted from a true story--The Great Escape with much less action and much more Serious Talking. It took a bit to get going but now we're quite enjoying it, though it is terribly British, dour muted atmosphere and upper-lips so stiff one could hammer nails with them. (DMc's own upper lip is adorned with a mustache (sigh) as hot-headed young Flight Lieutenant Carter; it cracks us up that as far as we can tell the char's meant to be about thirty, when he was forty at the time - he doesn't have trouble pulling it off.)

The Invisible Man is in attitude like the otherwise unrelated SciFi Channel show of the same name, mostly comedy-action, though not as clever; it's pretty much a bad show across the board, if generally innocuous. It did, however, surprise us in the first episode. So DMc is the main character, the scientist who turns himself invisible. In the pilot he's happily married to a fellow scientist, and they're obnoxiously adorable together, calling each other "Doctor Westin" and snuggling and such. Naturally we spent the whole episode waiting for her to die - which she failed to do; instead of becoming the woman in the refrigerator, the wife becomes his partner, and for the rest of the series they run around doing missions together and having lots of happy marital sex (at least twice an episode, I'd say - she's married to David McCallum, who can blame her?) It's ridiculously cute - why isn't there more scifi with adorable married couples? Mmm, I love me some established relationshipping...

I wrote! New fic! Go me! Even if it is ridiculous fic. Initially inspired by a mfuwss discussion on our favorite secret agents' living spaces, and plotted on the journey back to America in collusion with gnine, who came up with half the pranks. It's slash (which, for me, seems to involve Napoleon having sex with lots of women. Yeah, I dunno. It's all in good fun?)

(Oh, and I drabbled again.)

MUNCLE: For Every Action {~6,000 words}
PG-13; slash, humor
A man's home is his castle, and Napoleon and Illya are laying siege on one another in a fierce, relentless, and very silly war of retribution.

( Illya rarely invited people over to his apartment... )

So, gnine and I survived the move, as did our luggage, all 6+ 50 lbs bags of it (minus the other six boxes that are coming by sea, which we'll hopefully see again in a month or two...keep your fingers crossed for them! Also keep them crossed for my marimo, one of them fell apart, and not sure they'll recover...) We're now ensconced in the brother's house in Seattle, which is slated to be my home for the next...um...I have no idea. gnine abandons me for the U.K. in a couple months, but for now we're settling in here...

Bit of a culture shock, being back in the U.S. (the store clerks chat with you! Everyone on the bus can understand what you're saying, and you can understand most of their conversations! ...And of course one of the first conversations we overheard were two teen boys discussing Final Fantasy...you can't get far from Japan these days.) Pluses to being back: cheap Mexican fast food (mmmm bean burritos, how I missed you!), cats I can pet (kitteh~~!) and the Star Trek movie is already out (opening today in Japan) so I got to see it last night:

As an old-skool Trekkie, it was for the most part, squee~~! for me, with a couple minor quibbles. ( thoughts on the new Star Trek (which I can't call the "reboot" because that just makes me think Enzo Matrix...mmm, Matrix...) )

Also, with the bro, there has been the obligatory YouTube sharing: I saw the Superman theme song a while ago, but I didn't realize the guy had done more - I especially enjoyed Jaws and Terminator 2, and the Batman theme proved what I've been saying since I saw Dr. Horrible, that there needs to be a superhero musical. Badly. Also liked Halloween even though I've never seen the movies - it's actually as creepy as it is funny, and weirdly effective for that.

The sga_genficathon author reveals have been posted! Lots of great stories, and the bonus round is now open for more - go check it out!

My story was (as pretty much everyone guessed, gee I wonder why... ;):

SGA: The ATA Affair (or read it on AOOO) {~26,000 words}
PG-13; gen, Team; AU
Two of the S.G.C.'s top secret agents, Teyla Emmagan and Rodney McKay, are sent to the Casino Atlantis to investigate the suspicious business dealings of one John Sheppard...

It was written for the AU genre, and as you might be able to surmise from the title and summary, it was a wee bit influenced by my shiny new Man from UNCLE infatuation. It's also my longest completed SGA story, and rather indulges in my Rodney & Teyla friendship kink. What can I say; they make awesome partners. Teyla's level-headed patience and stone-cold coolness play off Rodney's brilliance and panic attacks perfectly.

In addition to MUNCLE, there's a few other crossover nods in the story, solely because I'm easily amused. Knowledge of any of the other series is unimportant to the actual plot, but since folks were asking, here's the complete list of crossovers, not counting SGA and SG-1:

( crossover references )

Busy day packing and cleaning. The Move is on Wednesday, the goodbye party's tomorrow. So to take my mind off of that, I am picspamming MUNCLE.

As the worst spies ever international super-spies, Napoleon and Illya don a variety of hats, most of which are ridiculous, or else ridiculously adorable - more the former for Napoleon, who accrues negative fashion karma nearly every time he puts something on his head; more the latter for Illya (even if it is a crime* to cover his hair.)

*punishable by death in eight countries, including Japan, San Rico, and Ingolstein.

So, in celebration of headgear!


"Must we do this, Napoleon?"
"Yes. Yes, we must!"

( onto the hats! )

Now! I must sleep.

(And let me know what amazing hats I've forgotten!)

Classic, absurdly indulgent h/c, because gnine asked for it, plotted on the nighttime streets of Hanoi a couple weeks ago. If you've read my fic in other fandoms, you might well have already read this story - with other characters, and there's sand instead of snow, and hyperthermia instead of hypo-, but really, same difference. My only defense is that for a series that lends itself to outrageous h/c, I haven't gotten as much as I'd like in MUNCLE...

As is my wont with h/c, this is noodling right on the edge of gen; you could call it smarm, or pre-slash, whichever. (I tried to keep it gen, but Napoleon was...uncooperative...) And much thanks to gnine, utopiantrunks, and naye for shared cheerleader/beta duties!

MFU: Sand Trap {~13,000 words}
PG, gen, h/c, action/adventure
Injured and pursued by THRUSH, Illya and Napoleon must survive a trek through the Sahara to get vital information to U.N.C.L.E. in time.

[Read it on AOOO]
or on lj:

( The THRUSH men never saw him coming. To their credit, neither did Napoleon, and he was Illya's partner... )

Okay, everyone on my flist needs to STOP talking about the new Star Trek movie RIGHT NOW, because I won't be able to see it for weeks, and resisting clicking on all the spoiler cuts is soooo haaa~rd!!!

There's something really cool about TOS gaining new life like this - new actors but the same characters, the same universe, the same story, realized anew to be adopted by the next generations of fans. Spock joining the ranks of Sherlock Holmes and Superman, immortal as only fiction can be...

(...All right, I must ask: is there any good Kirk/Spock or Spock/Bones or Kirk/Spock/Bones in the movie? Slashy or friendshippy, either's a-okay. No details, please, just yes or no...I have to know!)

gnine has made another vid! At my, er, suggestion. My wicked so-wrong-it's-SO-RIGHT suggestion. (Come on! It's Russian! It's perfect!) In case you've been wondering: yes, here is definitive proof that MUNCLE (and Illya) really is that gay. Seriously, it was the Merlin of its time.

Malchik-gey

(And then there's the delightful My Brown-Eyed Boy, which offers compelling evidence that Napoleon is in fact even gayer than his partner, or at least swishier...)


Just finished watching the Scrubs finale. Loved it myself (I think this season's been really strong, am hoping it is the last, because it would be nice for it to go out so brightly) - the themes of goodbyes, the way life inevitably changes...yeah, resonating really strongly with me now. It was pouring all day today, and the the streets smelled clean and wet when I went out tonight, more like rain-damp stone than concrete. I never thought that a city could smell good, but Kyoto can. I'm going to miss my city...

In three weeks I leave Japan, moving back to the States. Coming back from Vietnam a couple weeks ago it really hit me, that it was our last time flying back into Kansai International, at least for a while.

gnine and I have been sharing this apartment in Kyoto for over three years. I'm going to miss it. I'm going to miss Japan. I don't know yet what I'm doing in America, but I've got a pretty stable set-up, so I'm not too worried about that. But I don't deal well with change, as a rule, and moving...it's a big change.

Not to mention I have three years of accumulated junk to sort through. Ah, the joys of packing!

So instead of dwelling on that...or getting down to the sorting...I'm writing Gnine ridiculous MUNCLE h/c. And go here for a very silly drabble, concerning Napoleon's particular expression on those occasions when Illya gets the Innocent.

(Also a lovely person recced my lone NCIS fic on crack_van, which means I've been getting new comments on it all day. This has made me unreasonably happy, as recs and comments always do. My ego-monster, she is (briefly) satiated...)

sga_genficathon 2009 is go! There's three Action/Adventure stories up now, and plenty more to come. Bring popcorn! Tell your friends! (And yes, yours truly has a vested interest, I managed a story for it...squeaked it in juuuuust under the wire!)

Joining the Dreamwidth deluge, I am xparrot over there. Haven't yet imported my lj; I'm currently in a holding pattern, seeing how this all shakes out, along with most of the rest of my flist, it seems. I'm lazy enough not to want to have to keep up with two different reading lists, but if that's how it goes down...well, I've been on boards, I've been on mailing lists, I've been on homepages, I've been on lj. Wheresoever fandom goes, there hence will I follow!

In related news, I also am X-parrot on the Archive Of Our Own beta - when it's publicly open and stable, I intend to post all my fic there, but for now I've only put up a handful of my recent stuff while I wait for the beta to shake out the kinks. Really looking forward to that going public - the tagging, though rudimentary now, makes me positively giddy.

So I accidentally-on-purpose read (well, skimmed) a MUNCLE death-fic today - well-written, clever, heart-wrenching. It wasn't angst-ridden; the opposite, really. (It was azdak's "Divided Halves" if you're curious.) And it broke me, as they usually do, and not in the good way, but in the makes-me-mopey and -flaily and -writing-essays-instead-of-my-sga_genficathon-story-which-is-due-Thursday way. I love black comedy, and death-badfic just cracks me up; it's the good ones that kill me and my fragile OTPer heart.

( musing on death-fic )

In other news, watched the Twilight movie with the MST3K fangirl squad of gnine, naye, and acchikocchi, and vaguely horrified myself by not hating it. Edward & Bella are as stalkerifically wrong a young love as Romeo & Juliet, but since they are teenagers (sort of) it doesn't bother me overly much, and oh! the emo! The director was so, hmm, sincere about the prettiness - so very shoujo, I could almost see the bubbles. And the sparkling was almost as hysterical as promised.

But the Cullen family was just so freakin' adorable I couldn't even laugh at them. A big happy vampire family! That plays baseball together! And cooks Italian! I've seen plenty of vampires trying to get on/stay on the wagon, but never a whole vampire family. Edward can actually depend on his vampire sire, and listens to him about the saving of his favorite hamburger true love...so much trust! Awww~!

Also saw the Who Easter Special. "I love you! I love you!" AHAHAHAH <333

(So~, does anybody have a Dreamwidth invite burning a hole in their virtual pocket?) Sankyuu~!

Today was a ficcing day. Short and quite silly; sweet if I'm lucky and maybe a little hot (if I'm really lucky). Thanks to gnine for the quick read-through, as well as for the deep and meaningful (okay, shallow and punchdrunk) discussion late last night (okay, early this morning) that led to the idea in the first place.

MFU: Discretionary Powers {~2,300 words}
PG-13; Napoleon/Illya slash; first-time, fluff
U.N.C.L.E. effects a change in policy, and Illya takes advantage.

( 'I have just heard from Mr. Waverly,' Illya said. 'Subsection C of Rule 37 has officially been rescinded from the U.N.C.L.E. Code of General Conduct.' )

For everyone on the flist who's been looking at my recent posts, wondering what the heck is up with my latest obsession: five graphic reasons to watch The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

1) Because in the '60s, they hadn't yet invented the concept of "personal space."


Or at least David McCallum & Robert Vaughn never got the memo.

( show me more... )