Words of Wood

Well, this has been A Week. After the thing I wrote on Thursday, which was rather an anguished howl into the universe, I've been very very slowly ticking away on the current Liu Sang one. In theory it should be barreling along now that I've done all the setup and am just on the trauma, but everything is just a bit difficult, really, isn't it?

(I had a birthday yesterday though, that was quite nice.)

-

"Xiaoge, can't you do something —"

"We need to move him," Zhang Qiling said, and his hand was firm on Liu Sang's back. "Liu Sang, can you stand up?"

For Zhang Qiling, voice quiet but inexorable, Liu Sang could. With support on both sides, he pushed up shakily from his knees, and staggered forward, still with his hands squeezed tightly over his ears and his eyes screwed shut. He walked step by step, relying on the others to guide him. He could barely be sure that he was vertical; he had nothing left over to care about which way he was going.

This is the first Sunday Snippet I've had in ages, as I'm actually writing and not just for an imminent fest!! Apparently I imprinted on Liu Sang way harder than I realised (was definitely helped by writing the 9k POV fic for him) and I'm now in the writing stage of "rehash all my favourite and well-trodden fic tropes*, only with this NEW character". This one is done but not edited, and then I have two more longer oneshots currently in the pipeline. (I do think this is likely to be a oneshot sort of fandom. Unlike with Guardian, I'm not really thinking of *plot* so much, and also there's not the obligation to work out "how does this very intelligent and high-powered character get into this situation in the first place?" given that Tomb Show is very much the OPPOSITE of that problem.)

Except, usually when I do this I'm in a new fandom with a brand new audience, and I think probably most of the people reading my Liu Sang fics will also have read my Shen Wei ones, whoops XD

(*By "fic tropes" I actually mean "hurt/comfort tropes", I'm sure no one's surprised to hear that. Also everything's back to being gen, which is something of A Relief to my brain.)

(I need some Liu Sang icons.)

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"It's me," Liu Sang said, and then realised he hadn't considered how to play this. Probably Wu Xie had tons of secret signals to use in this sort of circumstance, but that wasn't the type of thing Liu Sang thought of arranging ahead of time. "I, uh —"

"What?" Wu Xie asked, and then began to sound amused. His bedsprings creaked as he rolled over. "Liu Sang, are you drunk-dialling me?"

That was a way in, and Liu Sang seized it. "Yes!" he said, almost frantically. "Yes, I am. I miss you, baby. We should get back together."

Wu Xie snorted with laughter, but he was also sitting up, his breath catching as he focused. "Liu Sang, are you in trouble? If you are, say that you love me more than Xiaoge."

Writing is still very slow for the same very boring reasons, but I am finally moving again. And now I only have two and a half scenes left in Sky Ships! (I think. Don't quote me.) Then I need to make sure I do my editing as soon as I finish, because it's going to be posting over the time I have this baby and goodness knows I am bad enough not doing all my edits down-to-the-wire as it is.

(Okay, I confess that what I also really really need to do is write the last couple of scenes in Boundaries. Because I'm only three weeks away in my posting schedule to catching up to myself, and the mental block I have on that fic is ridiculous. I know exactly what happens and everything! I just... don't want to work on it.)

Anyway, some more Sky Ships. Btw, the snippets I've been posting have been completely out of order as I just randomly pick a bit I like each week, they do not form a coherent narrative :P

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Shen Wei broke open the seal. It was from Wu Tianen. Zhu Jiu left port about two hours ago, it said, followed by a string of numbers.

"Do you know what this means?" he asked, and showed it to Zhao Yunlan.

"It's a bearing," Zhao Yunlan said. "This is the direction he sailed out on." He took a deep breath. "Get us ready to leave!" he called, loudly enough for the crew on deck to hear him.

Then he turned back to Shen Wei. "Don't go," he said, urgently. "Please — we can talk about this. But don't go."

I didn't do a lot of writing last week. I was busy being incredibly anxious and also sick.

Here's some more of sky ships, though!

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"Is this as bad as I think it is?" Zhao Yunlan whispered.

Shen Wei nodded tightly. Then the centipede lunged, and he darted in towards its side, carving a slice between segments carapace with his blade and spinning away before those poison fangs could reach him.

Zhao Yunlan was attacking too, although with less finesse, aiming for the waving legs. Shen Wei tried to keep the head engaged, moving in and out, jabbing at any weak point he could see between the brown plates. He was painfully aware that the longer they took to kill it, the more chance they had of attracting further forest creatures.

Zhao Yunlan stepped sideways, and his injured leg folded beneath him. Shen Wei leapt in front of him before the centipede could strike, driving it back. "Can you climb?" he called. The centipede could climb too, if they both tried that escape, but if just Zhao Yunlan got clear then Shen Wei could continue fighting it on the ground.

But Zhao Yunlan stared at the rough trunk of the tree and back to Shen Wei. "How?" he asked.

Chapter 4 of All the Boundaries Between is now up! Things are Happening.

-

This week I have been obsessively working on the sky-ship AU. I started it last Sunday and have not written anything today yet. It is currently 18,033 words in seven chapters. I don't think I have written anything this fast ever.

I don't think I'm yet at the half-way point. But things it has so far: secret identities, floating islands, developing relationship, murder pterodactyls, flirting, awful decision-making from both our leads, sword fights. I am having A BLAST writing it.

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Zhao Yunlan nodded agreement. "Hey, you want a go at the wheel?"

"What?" Shen Wei asked, alarmed.

"It's fine!" Zhao Yunlan said, laughing. "We're sailing in a straight line right now. You just need to hold her steady. Here, look." He took Shen Wei's far hand and guided it onto the edge of the wheel, then pushed Shen Wei's shoulder gently until he moved to stand directly in front of it. "See? Easy."

Shen Wei didn't know what to say. Zhao Yunlan took Shen Wei's other hand and placed it on the other edge of the wheel. He didn't take his own hands away, so his body remained close against Shen Wei's back, his breath warm on Shen Wei's neck.

"Ready to try on your own?" Zhao Yunlan asked, into Shen Wei's ear, and Shen Wei still couldn't manage to say anything. He stood, rigid, while Zhao Yunlan laughed again and then stepped away to lean on his elbows against the railings to the side. "Just hold her still. You're doing great."

I completely forgot about this last week and then spent the first half of the week vaguely meaning to make a catch-up post and never getting round to it. Anyway, still writing the fix-it, it is definitely going to continue the thing in Guardian fandom where each longfic I write is longer than the previous one. Goblin Fruit was 38k and this one is currently 37k and still a few chapters from the end.

I am considering starting to post it this week. I did the chapter-splitting as I went, this time, which I found much less stressful than trying to do that afterwards. I'm partway through ch 16 at the moment -- they're all around 2.5k. I am intending to post twice a week, since I don't think I can keep up with my usual three times a week at present and also I kept getting comments on the last couple of fics from people who hadn't had time to keep catching up between chapters.

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( snippet )

Whoops, it's longer than I realised since I last posted anything. I've been doing some writing, slowly. I've read some books too but haven't been reading any fic at all, I don't quite know why. At least I'll have a nice backlog when that bit of my brain turns back on?

( More post-canon fic )

It's really nice to look at my writing tracker spreadsheet and see my numbers finally start to creep back up again. December fell off a cliff and the second half didn't get put in the spreadsheet at all, January I wrote 14/31 days but extremely scattershot, and so far in February I've written on every day except one.

Anyway, I really like having a longfic to write at the moment. I like being in the middle of a project and can just keep writing without worrying too much about editing or whatever. (I do know the Jiajia series breaks on something of a cliffhanger, I'll get back to it eventually.)

So! More post-canon. Also if someone can tell me whether I am thinking of the wrong Chu twin I would greatly appreciate it, I *still* don't quite understand from the incredibly confusing flashback which bits are real.

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Lao-Chu sighed heavily. "Lao-Zhao," he said, "Don't do this to yourself."

Zhao Yunlan pushed him out of the way and got up again. Then had to grab Lao-Chu's shoulder to keep himself steady. "I'm not — You need to believe me. This is real."

"So you want us to break into the palace and steal the Hallows," Lao-Chu said.

"Yes!" It was good that Lao-Chu had finally caught up. "Your twin worked at the palace when you were younger, didn't he? You must know ways in."

"You're extremely drunk," Lao-Chu said. "You do realise that, don't you."

Of course he did. That had been the point of drinking.

I've finished the time loop fic and it just needs editing now. Hopefully will be posted sometime this week.

Meanwhile I started something new, which is a fic set post-canon that's actually as canon-compliant as I can make it. (Obviously it will be a fixit.) That's new for me as I tend to ignore most of at least the last episode. It's probably going to be another entry in the exciting genre of angst + Dixing politics.

So, I quite like my thing of posting the entire first 100 words or so when I start a new story. Here's this one.

---

( Cut for spoilers )

Have more time loop!

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Zhao Yunlan, pale but awake and sitting up, was watching him grimly. "Yeah," he said. "You never pay any attention to that bit…"

Shen Wei pushed himself up gingerly. "What happened?" he asked.

"I did tell you not to use your dark energy," Zhao Yunlan said. "I always tell you. At least my team listen when I call them, or they do now that I threaten them with not getting paid at all this month and also tell them in graphic detail about what happens if Lin Jing keeps poking his devices — Sorry, I'm rambling." He took a deep breath. "Are you feeling okay? You didn't get as far as actually beginning to heal me this time, right?"

"I'm fine," Shen Wei said, blinking away the last of the sparks. "But — what do you mean? This time?"

"Time loop," Zhao Yunlan said. "I know, it sounds ridiculous. Or did. I've had a lot of time to get used to the concept. Time." He laughed, a little unsteadily. "And I'm wasting it. If you're okay we have to go."