Tagged by always wonderful @serenpedac and I feel a little silly doing this as I don't think I wrote... anything?? fandom related (aside from picking at a few Nate and Kat things, which makes me a bit sad!) but I did do a bunch of original writing and I like numbers, and this is making me actually calculate those stats.
Total words written: 176,000
First draft: 88,000 words
Additional outlining, worldbuilding, warm ups, deleted scenes, ect: 50,000 words
Developmental re-outline and expanded scene development list: 24,000 words
*Realized that this draft is not working, and won't work without significant changes to either the beginning or the end, and is actually two stories competing with each other.*
**Wallowed in the pits of writerly despair**
***Accepted that I am starting over from page one***
New outline: 14,000 words (Already this feels more coherent and stronger and structurally sound - I'm excited to get to actually writing it. )
new things I tried: book
favourite thing(s) i read: I read 25 books this year, which is so many more than I've managed in the past. One trilogy was also like 1,900 pages long which felt like reading 7 books and not three. A lot were big romantasy titles to get a better sense of the genre. But my favorites were weird sci-fi / speculative fiction haha
House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski and
Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
writing goals for 2026: book
More specifically - first draft of this book that has risen from the bones of the old work. Aiming to finish by March and have something ready to submit to agents by May.
Rules: post the beginning lines of your most recent 10 published fanfics, then attempt to tag 10 people!
Thanks dear @serenpedac for the tag and thinking of me - I loved seeing your opening lines and getting reminded of your wonderful writing!
Please note a bunch of these are Rated E, I'm not going to tag it all though in this post.
Tagging: @lalizah @thee-morrigan @wayhavenots @anticupid16 @nat-seal-well and anyone else who wants to!
(If you've already been tagged, please tag me in your post so I can see it!)
All That I Ask you Promise
“The yellow light of an opal, on the white-walled houses dies, the roadway beyond my garden, it glimmers with golden eyes. Alone in the faint spring twilight, the crepuscle vague and blue…”
Nate hesitates, and Kat does the same, lifting up so her lips are barely brushing the head of his [REDACTED]
(ahahaha we get RIGHT INTO IT with this one)
2. I come to you
I build a house for you. I furnish it with memories and decorate the walls with all the things that cannot exist between us. I make rooms for the friendship we share and try to content myself to live there, among such beautiful things.
3. Routine Body Maintenance
Kat is not looking at Mason. She’s looking everywhere else in her office, but not at him, because her heart rate is none of the team’s goddamn business.
She’s looking at Felix sitting in a chair. She’s looking at Nate standing next to him. She’s looking at her fern-plant-thing that desperately needs water.
4. Spare Parts
It is 7:25 on a Tuesday evening in late August, and we are going to be late for the planetarium show. It's not entirely my fault, we should know by now that the sight of me in heels distracts you and then in turn, you try to distract me.
5. The Well
“Inquisitor.”
How long has it been since someone called her by her name?
Not Inquisitor. Nepenthe.
There will be strife.
6. Always For the First Time
The wind whips outside the Agency’s remote safe house, banking more snow against the windows and rattling the panes. A storm with teeth, Kat thinks as she leans on the windowsill and looks out into the darkness.
7. To Plant a Seed
The dirt of my home has a scent. Of rain, and roots, and rock. Of open fields, and flowers, and trees that grow greater in my memory the longer I am away.
Or maybe I diminish.
Here, there are only black scents: death, ash, blood.
8. Present
“Why do we have to go to this thing again?” Mason tugs on his tie knot as Unit Bravo walks up the stairs to the Wayhaven Inn. An upscale place, heavy on the small town charm, with a wide, wrap-around porch groaning under the weight of pine garland and an antique sleigh.
9. Station Duty
It's a Friday at the station, the end of her work week, and while the staff has slowly dwindled over the course of the day, her workload hasn’t. Kat picks up the folder labeled Blood Drive in huge, red, horror-movie letters (it seemed funny to her at the time, in a slightly unhinged way), and holds it over the piles on her desk that she thinks of as “Important Paperwork” and “Unimportant Paperwork That Will Inevitably Be Done First” because she’s procrastinating on the important paperwork. It’s a delicate psychological game.
10. Natural Progression
It was a perfect day for planting. Early spring, when the world sings. Even leaving my office at the art museum for the evening, I could feel it through the layers of flooring and the soles of my heels, each hurrying, staccato step taken faster until the rhythm of my pace matched the rhythm of the song and I couldn’t stop until I’d descended the grand staircase outside and crossed the lawn, my heels strewn like bright petals in my wake.
11. BONUS OPENING (from the original WIP, it'll probably change completely eventually....)
I hear you want the truth. Listen closely, then—and remember. I won’t be able to weave it for you. The Weavers control the woven tapes, and despite six years as an apprentice, I never showed the slightest aptitude.
That doesn’t mean I can’t tell stories, though.
On the contrary—the stories I tell are wonderfully believable.
Sorry. A private joke.
I’m sure you’ve heard not to trust a word binder and have no inclination to believe me, but this story is true.
Thank you dear @lalizah for the tag! Your snippets were wonderful. I haven’t written much lately and I don’t have anything nearly so polished to share, but it did make me go and poke at a Nate and Kat WIP that’s been simmering in the back burner forever. So Yay!
Mostly bare bones dialogue at this point because that’s often how I start to build a scene…
Established future poly relationship with Mason / Nate / Kat (but no Mason in this one)
Kat is talking first and they’re walking through a TBD European city, probably Vienna
—————————————
“Are you happy?”
“About?”
“Not about anything. I mean are you happy generally. No, not happy.”
“Not happy?”
“No, just… Satisfied. Settled.”
“Settled. Does it seem like I’m going somewhere?”
Kat lets the question hang as they cross the street. Nate offers his arm and she takes it, heels wobbling dangerously close to a sprained ankle on the uneven cobblestones. He steps effortlessly over a puddle next to the curb and when he pulls her across and into his arms it’s as easy as dancing. She could give into the distraction just as easily and drop the questions, but aren’t those the steps they always take?
“Sometimes,” she says instead. “Not physically. But here?”—she touches her temple—“and here?”—a press to her sternum—“sometimes. Which is… I wish you would talk to me and Mason about stuff that’s bothering you.”
“Nothing is bothering me, my Katherine.”
“I think you want that to be true.”
“Well, I suppose there was that awful antique store full of fakes, but I believe I talked about that a great deal.”
“That’s not what I mean and you know it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I—god, Nate! I don’t know. Why don’t you have this yet?” She gestures impatiently to the infinity symbol on her necklace. A tiny diamond is set on either side of it. One for Mason. One for Nate. A matching design is tattooed on the inside of Mason’s ring finger.
“Oh, darling. Is that what’s bothering you?”
“I thought you were going to get that watch engraved.”
“I was, but…”
“But?”
“It has to be right.”
“What wasn’t right about the watch?”
“It wasn’t…”
“Perfect?”
“No, it just wasn’t right. I want it to be right and—ah, we’re here.”
Posting a little snippet more of the Kat and Nate fic (possible title: Hunger. The blood.) because I’m actually making words!
——————-
In front of the convenience-store-which-is-no-longer-a-cafe, the neon light of the closed sign in the window bathes his face in blue, settling into the gaunt hollows of his cheeks.
“When did this happen?” he asks, and she wonders the same about the change in his face.
“We’ll find something else, Nate. It's okay.”
“I dragged you all the way out here. Not much of a special evening, I’m afraid,” he says with an apologetic half smile.
“We’re out together, that’s special enough.” She steps closer and slips her hand into his.
“Of course you’re right, my Katherine,” he says and his smile warms into something more genuine. “But my company alone won’t feed you, and you must be starving by now.”
So must you, she thinks as he kisses her forehead, but she will not say that aloud. As she has not said that aloud for weeks and weeks.
I had this idea kicking around in my head for a future scenario for while and wrote it this morning. I’m sorry in advance??
Today and today and today
Pairing: Mason/F. detective (Kat Langford) Kat POV
Rating: G
Word count: ~400
Content warning: Grief.
——————-
Today what I miss most is waking up with you. Today what I miss most is your smile after being apart. Today what I miss most is seeing you at the sink, washing the coffee pot even though you don’t drink it.
Today I had my blood cold, straight from the package, the way you drank it. Unparticular. Fueled by other things. I hate it, but it’s the way you drank it.
I hate it. I think I hate it. I hated it once. Now I find it doesn’t really matter one way or the other. Now it’s only fuel for the waiting. Now I am focused on other things, like being stretched around the hole of you.
I go for walks at 2 AM in the quiet dark—no longer quiet, no longer dark, but alive, alive, alive with a thousand heart beats. (Not one of them yours.) Overhead, the dying light of a million ancient stars still exists in the universe, but you don’t. You don’t, and I wait for you, and I try to understand how I will never see you again, even now, when I will live until the end of time. I wish I could explain it better. Forever is a black ocean. You were my raft.
Today what I miss most is your hand in mine. Today what I miss most are the faces you made when you shaved. Today what I miss most is the joy of looking at you across the table.
I still leave your shirt draped over the back of the chair in our room, except for when I lay it on the bed, and lay myself on emptiness that smells of you.
Adam called. He said I should stay busy. I try to stay busy. I start projects. I read reports. I lose my place. There is always a feeling I should be doing something else. (What? What am I meant to be doing? Please tell me.)
I can’t answer Nate’s calls yet.
Today what I miss most is your voice. Today what I miss most is your hands on my waist. Today what I miss most is saying your name. Today what I miss most is tomorrow. All the tomorrows.
