Well, that's most of February down...

I didn't realize I hadn't posted in more than a month. :P Ah well, I'm behind on everything anyway.

I got more chapter notes for TWC2; I'm going to try to do another chapter and then do the ones for the latest chapter of TWC4 too :)

Anyway here we go: TWC2 Act II, Chapter 1:

References:

Um, I don't think there are any in this one. O_o A couple of vague callbacks to episodes, but nothing really specific. The family picture that Beth looks at appears in at least one or two eps. That's actually it... I guess it's a sign of maturity that I write my own jokes now instead of referencing the shows I watched all the time, but I kinda miss the refs. :P

***

- This is actually my first time rereading this in at least a year... I'm kinda impressed with how I wrote this chapter, actually, even though nothing much happens in it. Just a good chapter for seeing Gosalyn from an outsider's perspective, and for DW in general, I think. God I'm an egotist. :P

- I'd actually forgotten that I went into a rundown of how Gosalyn's mind worked on homework. This seems apt, actually. I was thinking, I believe, of how we've seen her do homework on the show - I think maybe in "Whiffle While You Work?" She just zips through it whether it's right or not so that she can do other things. But she's clearly really very smart and just doesn't want to spend the time applying herself. I'm really not trying to get into a "real world" dissection of how Gos's personality and intellect work, but I like to stick a tiny bit more realism and detail (not too much, I hope) into my fics than are in the cartoons. What I like about the cartoons is that they imply this behind the scenes, intentionally or not. You can read this sort of thing to it if you want to look for it. :)

- And then meanwhile, I love when Gos turns around and gets into trouble. She's so GOOD at it. My original version of this fic had more specific instances of troublemaking but I didn't really like them then and I hate them now. I thought it would be better to just sort of gloss over Gos doing whatever she likes (including breaking things) and Beth cleaning up after her, only to stand up and find something new has been broken. XD It's OK, though, Beth likes to clean. :P

- What's sort of more important and kind of up to the reader to decide if it works is Beth's liking of Gosalyn (underneath the personality mismatch Beth gets really attached to her really quickly) as well as Gosalyn's initial semi-detached liking of Beth. I think this starts as "she's not really bad and she lets me do what I want" but I'm not sure where exactly it turns into liking her for real. I guess it's just based around the fact that Gosalyn, unlike her father, doesn't *dislike* many people for no reason. Beth, yeah, she can be a bit... much, but she's actually better with kids than with adults, and so she's not as irritating as she is with Drake. But that comes later - she's basically in a "please walk all over me" stage in this fic with Gosalyn. Still though, I think Gosalyn's reaction to her is decent. Not mean-spirited, she just takes the opportunity to have a good time and get away with stuff, and Beth isn't bothering her.

- I'm not *really* sure when I came up with the idea that DW would think Beth is a supervillain. I think it was before I got very far into this fic, though. I mean, I know I hinted at the end of TWC1 that he thought she'd been in cahoots with Megavolt, but that was really a passing thing... I hadn't intended for him to return to it once Megs was defeated and she showed up again. But then I had the idea that this would be his keystone excuse for disliking her - when of course, really, he's just suspicious of her *because* he doesn't like her. But it's easier to dislike someone when you think you have a really great rationale. XD

- In spite of his view on Beth I never, ever mean for DW to come off as too mean, or as unsympathetic, or as dislikable. There are episodes of the series where he's an absolute *creep*, to people he really loves; yet we still love him and relate to him. That's all I was going for here, just the fact that it would be more in his character to dismiss or downright dislike someone like Beth (and it creates drama because she's gone on him), not to make him look BAD. I hope nothing I write looks like character assassination, because it's really done with love and acceptance, even appreciation, of Drake's flaws.

- So help me I love the scene between DW and Gos. :) The cute parts, I mean. I love writing their interactions, the way they love each other so much but push all of each others' buttons, and sometimes can't resist doing so on purpose. :D

- Fifty points for having Gos completely, straight-faced get offended that her father would even THINK of suggesting that she'd have Beth do her homework for her. I think she's even actually offended by the suggestion even though it's totally true. XD

- UGH LATE NIGHT INVENTORIES, Beth, I feel for ya.

Notes for Chapter 3 of TWC2! THIS IS HAPPENING. Because I have to get through these damn things sometime.

References:
- Harry Potter (Gillyweed). Not sure why I tossed that in there except that it's kind of cute. I'm not really much of a Pottergeek and probably wouldn't catch half the refs someone else might throw into this sort of thing.
- The Simpsons - kind of; Gos's "All of it?" in response to Beth asking her what area she needed help in is a throwback to Homer's response to being asked what safety initiatives he has spearheaded in his role as safety inspector. "...All of them?"

First scene: I've always envisioned Bushroot as basically being a vine-like structure. I think that's obviously the case with his arms, anyway. I guess his body could be considered a stem, but I like the increased flexibility that it would have from being a vine. Still, though, this refers to his arms and they are definitely vines, IMO. haha, like I'm the definitive opinion. XD

I love Spike. I love the interactions between Spike and Bushroot. I tried to write the parts where Bushy is all mad scientist and then goes into "normal guy mode" with Spike around. :D

Listen to me BS about how this compound works! I thought long and hard over this half-assed explanation! Originally the fic just had Bushroot able to just... make all the plants get big. I decided for him to do it all throughout the entire town he'd need some kind of help, but he can make formulas easily, so why not here?

Playing early on with the "secret identity" dance, and keeping Beth from figuring it out. Not sure how convincing this is... it's always going to be a big huge plot hole for me and I can't fix it. *sigh*

So here's another thing I thought long and hard on, and didn't really effectively manage, IMO. HOW would Beth manage to get Gos to do what she asks? Beth is good with kids, surprisingly, but not with telling people what to do. And Gos is really good at not doing what she's told, anyway. There's no reason that Gos wouldn't walk all over her, unless Beth can offer something. So I came up with the moderately unethical solution of Beth offering to do half of Gos's homework, and rationalizing it to herself by making Gos do the other half. XD

I tried to make Gos sound like herself, be likable but a handful.

Aaaand we return to "Beth Mallard". And LP getting as big of a kick out of it as I do. XD

By this point I had hit on the idea that perhaps DW might keep Beth around because he's suspicious of her, and that it would give him an excuse to keep disliking her. So this was how I set it into motion.

And we end with another Spike scene. So much fun to write. :D Tried to visualize this and then give some POV reactions as I thought Spike's body language might suggest them. :)

It is 60 minutes after I intended to go to bed

I may keel over.

I'm jus tgoing to jump into chapter notes on TWC4. I know this is jarring b/c I haven't done any notes on Chapters 1 or 2 but... I'll get to those later. :)

References:

- The Big Bopper and Buddy Holly
- Also "Buddy Holly" by Weezer - I couldn't resist on that one.
- DWD episode "Twin Beaks"


- Okay, Chapter 3 and we FINALLY get a reference to the earthquake plot being more than just a backdrop for the fic :P And it will take even longer to see that pan out... think "next act"...

- I think this might possibly be the earliest (chronological) reference to the fact that Beth used to live in Duckburg. I'm pretty sure I hadn't mentioned this in the earlier fics anywhere.

- You know, Beth's thought that maybe she won't be seen by "too many people who matter" when she finds that Launchpad is the one who answers the door is just.. mean. She doesnt' realize it's mean but it's mean. :(

- This scene was really hard to write. I'm not sure why... well for one it went on a little too long and I couldn't cut things without making it disjointed so I kept having to just trash it and rewrite it, pushing a bit harder in a particular direction. But also, getting the right tone was SUPER tricky. You know - just making sure that it didn't come across as mean, and that there was a reason that he'd think she was fine with the conversation. The reason is because she dislikes confrontation and she's telling herself to lighten up, so she makes herself go along with it but the minute he starts implying that she might not be UNattractive she can't take it since she takes it to mean the reverse.

- Right after the Launchpad scene I had a scene with Beth speaking to Binkie and being kind of fascinated with her... from the perspective of, like, "I didn't think that mothers like her still existed today!" I kept it and I'll put it up here maybe tomorrow, I think ther'es nothing wrong with it, but it was not essential to the plot at all. Just cut for length. At this point in the fic, they have met before (the previous night in fact), but Beth just can't figure out how to respond to Binkie.

- The original version of the fic had Launchpad driving Beth and Gos to the mall, but not staying with them. He did it just because he was sweet on Beth so you could say pretty much anything like "Beth needs a drink of water" and he'd go get it. Or "Beth needs an entire new wardrobe" and he'd be like "What colour?" Which is a terrible idea, to let LP pick out your clothes. But I digress. Another difference is that instead of Honker going with them, Binkie accompanied them. I DO NOT KNOW WHY NOW. I thought about leaving that in but couldn't find any possible reason it would make sense. Instead it made more sense to have Honker along and let Beth hang out with two children vastly younger than her. :)

- So. I have to say. The stuff with Gosalyn all leaves me incredibly pleased with myself. I wish I'd heard from people who liked it but ... at least I've not heard from anyone saying they DON'T like it. Silver lining! :D Seriously though, I just had so much fun writing her and I think it's not only fun to read, I think it's in-character. I sure hope so anyway. I find GOs can be tricky to write.

- I don't think it's abnormal to have an eye exam/glasses store inside a mall. If it seems abnormal, please know that when we were in college my husband used to go to a dentist whose office was in the mall. So maybe it's just that kind of mall. Incidentally note how this puts a timestamp on the fic: there's a Halloween store mentioned, to remind you that it's October. :)

- The idea that Beth could just get not only frames and new lenses but also contact lenses, in approximately an hour, is silly. At least I think it is. I know it was when I first wrote it back in the mid-'90s... I assume it still is. But let's just go with it. It is not the only thing I will be asking you to suspend disbelief on during this fic. XD

- I discovered while RPing Beth that she doesn't let people move her outside of her comfort zone. I can't force her to do anything interesting because when I'm in her headspace she argues politely but ferociously. She nearly always wins. So it seemed logical to work that into the fic and have Gos get frustrated. Beth seems like a pushover but that's only when it's for someone else's benefit. If it's for hers she won't do it and you can't make her.

- Also I really need to write Honker more often. (I said that just the other day when I posted the preview for this chapter, I know.) He's just very... quiet. But I like having him around, and before the rewrites he didn't appear in the series until TWC5. Even if he's only been in it a little, at least he's been *present* since TWC3. Meanwhile, within this fic, I really liked having him and Beth jibe a bit on their opinions. They get along really well since in a lot of ways they're kind of um... the same character. ^^;

- Throwing in a reference to Honker's Aunt Trudy from Twin Beaks just happened but it felt natural. I like it. :)

- I think I've said this before, but I'll specify it again: Beth is actually a very good seamstress, but you can't tell it from looking at her clothes because she doesn't make them to fit her properly. She makes all her shirts at least one size too big, for reasons unknown. I don't show that properly in my pics of her. :P But it's true!

- Favourite line in this one is Gosalyn's dismissal of the candy store comparison.

Hey, Hey, I wanna be a rock star

More TWC2 chapter notes! I realized I should've been doing these every time I put up a chapter. Maybe I'll start putting them up for TWC4 as I go. But I'm so behind... Anyway here's chapter 2 of TWC2, "Sea of Green".

References:

-Fic: TWC1, "My Kingdom for a Double-Plait Bolt", in the reference to Beth having given the wrong name when she introduced herself.
-The Simpsons (LP saying he'd square things before she arrived, then forgetting UNTIL she arrived, is based on Homer doing the same thing in a different situation)
- The Simpsons again - indirectly; I've always drawn a little bit of inspiration from Bart Simpson for Gosalyn, in terms of getting into trouble. So LP's overwhelming "And there's the tour of all of our fire extinguishers" and so forth really sort of starts with that.
- It doesn't really REALLY count as a reference since it's a part of nearly every episode of the show, but Beth references "Basil of Baker Street", the name of the book that became Disney's "The Great Mouse Detective". Since, of course, the statue that activates the transport chairs is Basil from GMD.

Okay, as a just sort of overview of this chapter, I found it really challenging to come up with a good reaction for Drake to have, and a reason why he'd let her stay and not just turn her down. I think it's kind of a reach, and it was a reach to keep it going afterwards, but... there had to be some reason, right? Better a slight reach than just no acknowledgement of the fact that it makes no sense for him to have a stranger babysit Gos, right? Bah. Sometimes I wish I'd come up with a different way to get Beth into the main cast. :P

Beth's mental description of Drake is me trying to put myself into her head and find him attractive. Since even though I love Drake dearly, I am completely not attracted to him in the slightest, this is always hard. XD

A return to Beth Mallard, from the last fic. Which I have to admit I thought was hilarious and have to bring up as often as I can. It's possibly my favourite throwaway gag in the whole fic.

Every so often I run into an awkward situation with Beth and Launchpad where he does something that I would almost swear should upset her or make her angry, and instead she thinks it's cute. Every time it happens I wonder if it makes sense that she'd think it was cute or if she should really be disappointed in him. I *think* it's okay, because Beth is rarely disappointed in anyone but herself, and when it comes to Launchpad she honestly thinks he hung the moon most of the time; so she lets him get away with a lot. That might not work quite right in other peoples' heads though, which... I can't really defend.

Awkward attempt at writing out a visual gag: Beth knocking over and almost breaking the framed picture. That would work SO much better if it was not a described action.

LP flirting with Beth, awwww XD Apparently, looking at this chapter... he does that a LOT. O_o

The bowling excuse was in the original fic, and I couldn't think of a better one (plus I just... really thought it was funny for some reason), so it remains. Flimsy excuses FTW!

I really enjoyed Beth's dramatic reaction to being hired as babysitter, somehow. He's all "Yeah yeah whatever" and she's all "Me so happy me want to cry D8"

Beth mentions "Basil of Baker Street" and not "The Great Mouse Detective" because I liked the idea that Basil is essentially Sherlock Holmes in this universe, and thus a well-known literary figure and known AS "Basil of Baker Street". Sure, the movie "The Great Mouse Detective" might have been made, but that's just ONE of the film adaptations of Basil. ...Or so I have decided. XD

If you were to ask me for my favourite moments of writing Drake or Darkwing I'd have to say my single fave line is the one he gives Beth about the view from OUTSIDE the house. That one, somehow, feels the most in-character; something Drake would slip in to be sarcastic and rely on whoever he's saying it to just not getting it. And in Beth's case, it works, because she just doesn't expect to be spoken to that way so it doesn't quite connect for her.

Beth's line "I would be pleased beyond belief to do that!" works best if you envision it being said very loudly and matter-of-factly. She's completely sincere, but she's also trying VERY hard to be noticed in her sincerity.

My Daughter Wants to be Scrooge McDuck

That's not just a clever title. It's the honest truth. And to be fair this bothers me not at all. XD

Anyway I thought, just as a change of pace from the 30-day-meme I've been doing about my writing, I'd start the TWC2 Chapter Notes. I haven't done any chapter notes in a LONG time. First I guess I should check and make sure I haven't already started these...

Okay, checks out. Let's go!

References:
-Title: it's a line from the Beatles song "Yellow Submarine": "Sky of blue/and sea of green/in our yellow/submarine". I was on a HUGE Beatles kick during most of high school and this was written in the height of it.
-Obligatory callback to "Night of the Living Spud" with the Lyceum Nycanthropus.

I began this first scene about a year before I actually started writing the full fic. I think I started the fanfic in the second half of 2010, but I had the opening sequence done, I think, in late 2009. If not then, then in like early 2010 or so. I was trying to get back into writing after a really long hiatus during my second pregnancy and my son's first few months.

Laelia is in fact an orchid; I went looking for plant names for things like orchids that could be rare but work as actual names.

The conversation between Beth and LP initially got away from me and they started talking about how he knew Gizmoduck personally and all this stuff and it was like "STOP FLIRTING AND STAY ON SUBJECT!" They *always* do that. I had to send it to Amanda and have her tell me exactly where to snip it. ;)

I'm not really sure of the pacing of this scene or - well, the circumstances; and I'm not sure how much sense it makes for Beth to be so into Drake. I just kind of have to go with it. I have to be honest; I don't remember what it's like to have a crush on someone. ^^;

The inventory - when I wrote this the first time, I had the same thing in here, despite not ever having had a retail job. It was just vague and mainly involved me having Beth stay late to "do the inventory" which meant counting hte stock, since that's the textbook definition. However it's now slightly augmented by real-life experiences with retail - the late night and the counting turned out to be true, I ignored the fact that no retail store would have only *one* person do the retail, but I added stuff with paperwork. The paperwork is killer.

That's about it for chapter 1...

Don't Say No to the Incredible Medicine Show

More notes for AAE! Chapter 3 of Act I (or chapter 5 on ff.net)...

References:

-Dr. Camelback has some origins in a book called "Orphans of Chaos" by John C. Wright, though I have to admit that it's been so long now since I've read the book that I don't remember precisely how.
-Pattie, Violet, and Frieda are names from Charles Schulz's "Peanuts". They're all secondary characters who, I think, eventually got dropped. :P
-Nicola is slightly inspired by a character in "Fire and Hemlock" by Diana Wynne Jones (a girl named Nina).

I reference Beth as being "small for her age" in this section. She stays on the skinny side all her life, but I picture her as starting out tiny and then sprouting up like a weed in terms of height when she hits a certain age. Beth is not outrageously tall, but she's perhaps a bit taller than she should be, if that makes sense.

Poor Beth, getting taken advantage of from the first. The idea that a group of kids, the oldest of which is only 7, would be left alone to wander about for themselves was an effort to reinforce what Beth says before this flashback starts - that the people in charge forgot that high intelligence doesn't translate at all into maturity. A smart kid is still a kid.

Note the subtle statement in this scene that Beth does not wear glasses at age 7. I didn't have a good way to say that outright (it would've been weird to describe her as "not wearing glasses", after all) so it's a little bit subtle and perhaps easier to forget. I bet most readers imagine Wee Little Beth with glasses. (I almost do myself.)

Geez, Camelback is such a d***. ;D

I don't have a whole lot to say about the stuff at Pinny's; none of it is based on any real experience in my life so I can't talk about that, and it's fairly straightforward, I think. I hope it's not over the top; although I've never had these actual experiences, I've had strained relationships with adults (as I think many people have) and I've had trouble joining social circles (as I think many have, again) so I'm assuming these are somewhat familiar themes even if the events are themselves particular or perhaps a bit melodramatic.

Beth's mass-shunning in the cafeteria is a little reminiscent of a scene in Amanda Rohrssen's "The Other McCawber Girl", which was not intentional, though I will admit for full disclosure that I am pretty sure I had read that scene by the time I wrote this fic. I wasn't thinking of that, thogh, but rather of the general experience of being an outcast and being ignored. Beth's experience here, it should be noted, is not based at all on who she is but just on her being a stranger; it's not a personal reaction, it's just a mass ignoring. This almost uniformly typifies her experiences throughout this story: she's infrequently directly targeted, and much more often just overlooked, which I think is a common theme in growing up. Everyone gets targeted at some point, but being totally ignored - although less dramatic - can be painful too.

I wondered what to name Beth's three roommates for a while and then decided on the names from "Peanuts". Once I'd do that the personalities kind of dropped into place, especially Frieda's who clearly had to have naturally curly hair and also be a big of a braggart.

Beth ruminates on what she'd done to be sent away - we don't learn until later why she's so certain that this is what has happened - and she reflects that she could promise to change and be whatever her mother wanted if she could come back. This is also a recurring theme for Beth; she keeps, in her head, promising to change herself to be what other people want. I think it's noteworthy that she never ever does this.

Beth's staying at Pinny's over Thanksgiving is not a "Harry Potter" reference in case anyone was wondering, though on rereading it kind of looks that way. *shrug*

The "sad story about 2 older kids who fell in love but then died" is 'Romeo and Juliet'. I thought that this might be about what a 7-year-old would get out of it: the very bare bones of the story, with the rest being written in such apocryphal language and about such complicated things that it would basically go over her head.

As mentioned above, Nicola has roots in a girl named Nina from a Diana Wynne Jones novel. There's nothing specific that she does that mirrors this character, but Nina has a certain exuberance and a liking for imaginativeness, as well as a falling out with the main character, that were in my mind when I was thinking of characteristics for Beth's first "friend". The name, Nicola, has no significance.

Let's Take a Trip Together

Hi folks, here's some chapter notes for AAE! We're up to chapter two here (that's chapter two of Act I, or the fourth chapter I posted on FF.net if you're following at home. Or um... at FF.net, rather).

References:
- "The Simpsons" for Eeeeyelloooo? Not that they made it up, exactly, that's just what I was thinking of.
- "Who is this?" is a direct reference to "Seinfeld". If you've seen any of the episodes that use that (there are several) you'll know exactly how Gosalyn says it.
- "Comic Book Capers", for the engine knocking.
-Professor Pinfeather's School for Gifted Youngsters is a reference to "The Uncanny X-Men" - Professor Xavier's School for... etc.

Ah, the start of the school year... and covering your books. I hated that and usually managed to put it off for about a month, or until I got a note sent home.

I love how obnoxious Gosalyn is on the phone here. It's like the precise counterpoint to how annoyingly neurotic Beth is being - Gos is perfectly winding her up. My favourite way to write Gosalyn is by having her not take anything seriously.

I can't remember if there are any episodes that have LP working on the ThunderQuack when he's depressed (I'm rusty on a lot of the middle-to-late eps these days), but I know I've used it a lot among my fics for this reason. So hey. Inner continuity, anyway.

The idea that Beth could be easily swayed by being asked to do homework kind of comes, I think, from "The Simpsons"... I know someone used it first, manipulating someone into doing something by calling it homework. "The Simpsons" seems most likely. Any time I know I was inspired by something indirectly but I can't remember what it was, I usually assume it was "The Simpsons". :P

This scene here with Beth trying to think of her regrets is like a big teaser of the rest of the fic. I left out a few things, such as Ariana (I did know at the time that I would be bringing her in), which was intentional because I wanted her to be a surprise. The first release left out some things I didn't know I would include, but I've added them in now that the fic is complete.

So we start the flashbacks. The hardest thing in writing the flashbacks, for me, was setting them up. Trying to figure out what should be in the flashback and what should be monologued by Beth was tricky; I also always wanted to make it clear that Beth was not *telling* Dr. Mortimer everything that we see in the flashbacks, which was hard since I didn't want to tell every story twice (her words, and her experience). So there had to be enough crossover to show the difference, but not too much, and I had to guess at what would sound better coming from her and what would be better shown through narrative. Sometimes I think Beth just goes on too long. Then again, looking at these notes, I guess we know whose fault that is. :P

I probably don't have to explain this but Beth doing everyone else's work for them is a continued theme into her adult life, at least up to when she quits Bindler's Hardware. She'd still be doing it happily for Drake, if his line of work related to her expertise in any way, too.

Beth and being nice to people in hopes they'll be nice back - this is the very first sign of how jaded she is underneath, and how much she's been hiding that from her friends, family, and self. Actually it took *me* by surprise a little.

Part of why this fic is long (not the only reason... just *part*) is because Dr. Mortimer asks questions that aren't strictly related to the plot. There's a lot of filler conversation in here. I have a bad habit in my fics of letting the characters take over the dialogue - sometimes I really have to PUSH them to get them to go where I want, and Mortimer was like that a lot. Then again, I didn't want him to seem TOO insightful and always ask just the right questions - that's a little too convenient.

If Only I Don't Suffocate

Does anyone else want to write Epic Fanfic based on "Bend Or Break" by Keane? Surely not just me. (Not for DWD, though, it doesn't strike me with the right tone.)

Anyway! I have the next batch of notes for AAE here, would've had them sooner but I only unpacked and set up my home computer this week since we moved a month ago. :)P Here's the lengthy blabfest for Act I, Chapter 1!

***

References:

- "The Music Man"; as I said, Irene Webfoot is a nod to Mrs. Paroo from this musical. The line "an' yer changin' the subject" is a callback to the one song that Mrs. Paroo (kind of) sings on, an argument between her and her daughter where she is accused of changing the subject herself.
- "Donnie Darko" is the source of 'Yarn Barn', which is where Donnie's older sister works.

Man, there is stuff in here that I had forgotten I had already started by this point. Somehow that makes me feel awful. I didn't realize I was writing the therapy stuff this early... This fic just went on forever, didn't it? :P Not to mention I originally had Beth thinking how at this rate she'll need a month before she can see LP and Drake again... and then she's actually gone for nearly *two* months. Ay yi yi. The time got away from me, what can I say... I changed the line to "six months" just so it's less obvious. :P (And then I mention it here because I LIKE TO MAKE MYSELF LOOK DUMB apparently)

First scene with Beth and Irene, in which Beth immediately has no patience for her mother... Which I hope doesn't make her look unpleasant. I find it realistic. I know a number of adult women who respond this way to their mothers' well-meaning but nosy questions, and I'm NOT just referring to myself. ;) On the other hand, Beth isn't meant to be 100% in the right here, either.

And our total introduction to Candy! Candy is someone who took me a while to get to know. I had the idea for the scene between Candy and Beth towards the end quite early on, but I didn't really start to understand her as a character for a while. She remained a bit of a villain in my mind for a LONG time, which is pretty much what she is in these early scenes, though you can see a glimmer of sisterly love in there if you squint.

Actually, to be honest, Candy is a little bit based on me. I'm an older, rather than younger, sister, and I have perhaps too strong a dose of "I know best" in me. I kind of put that (on steroids, though) into Candy's personality. She goes way farther than I ever would.

I will be going somewhat more into the elements of Beth's personality that we see here; when she's around non-Webfoot people she so avoids confrontation that the idea of her arguing this much may seem completely alien. I'm going to address that in the rewrites of TWC, but I also address it (in a sort of retcon) in this fic and I hope it makes sense.

Dr. Mortimer is one of those names that I kinda picked out of nowhere because it sounded funny. Who knew I'd be writing it in nearly every chapter for the next three years. :P

I also have no idea if it's illegal or not to make an appointment for someone else to go to therapy. I think there are ethical reasons, the same way you can't have someone committed unless they're a danger to themselves or others, but it might not work that way for therapy - in fact I'm almost sure it doesn't but it made for a good way to show the extent of Irene's pushiness.

Beth not caring for waiting rooms is kind of a callback to "Something In The Air" which at the time was a throwaway gag. Deciding to turn throwaway gags into character points - yay! :P

I'm not sure where Beth's mistrust of therapists comes from, but it's a character trait I came up with in the late 90s. Personally I have high regard for the entire profession of psychology and psychiatry, and I ate up the classes I took. (Yep, armchair therapist right here.)

You can see me kind of scrambling to come up with reasons why Beth wouldn't just go in and say "okay, here's what the problem is" and would instead start talking about her life history. There were two reasons I needed the story to go that way: 1, it was intended to be Beth's life history and this was the format I chose to frame it in, and 2, I was actually just as uncomfortable writing Beth talking about DW and Launchpad as Beth was with doing the actual talking, and I took that as a sign that Beth didn't want to do it and that forcing it would be out of character.

Note the brief description of Beth's job. I have never made it clear what she does, and I thought I'd toss that in there to outline it in slightly more detail. It's still quite vague.

Not everything Beth says here to Dr. Mortimer about being happy is entirely true. You know how when you're depressed it seems like everything has always been, and will always be, as bad as it is right then? That's the problem she's having.

I think I've mentioned this before, but Dr. Mortimer's "therapy" idea of having Beth write down her big regrets so that they can discuss them... that's not really any kind of therapy idea I've heard of, and to be honest, I just picked that so that I had a way to roughly divide up the flashbacks in the fic. I wanted it to go more thematically than chronologically, even though most of the flashbacks are in order anyway, but yeah... that's the reason for the "regrets". I thought it might be useful from a discussion perspective, too.

Three posts in three days?! Has the world gone topsy-turvy??

I KNOW!

Anyway I put together some authors' notes (and babbling and random stuffage) on the prologue of "All About Eve". For those following along at FF.net (which is... everyone I think, right now anyway), the prologue is chapters 1 and 2. I'm not splitting them up here, but they will probably remain separate chapters when I post them on my site, because otherwise it's a terribly long prologue.

Though I am well aware that real prologues don't have two chapters. We'll just... overlook that.

Without further ado, except to mention that I have a sore throat and it is driving me CRAZY!, here are the notes!

Prologue:

References:

- Title: "All About Eve", classic Bette Davis movie; the title really has no relation to the content, it's just straightforward, all about Beth.
- "Back to the Future" - Candy's line about turning in her homework in Beth's handwriting.
- "Signs" - Tank swinging at everything during softball games. I had just rewatched the movie, so I snuck that in there. I did stop short of having Tank quote the film with "It felt wrong not to swing", though.

I have heard of situations where, to start with, an advanced kid was mistaken for a kid with a learning disability. But I think it might've been in "The Simpsons". I'm not sure that really happens but I thought Beth is so quiet that maybe even her parents would overlook the signs of advanced intelligence and focus in on the apparent problems she was having.

Writing Irene's accent is hard and I hate it. HATE HATE HATE it. I love hearing it in my head, but I hate actually writing it out. Incidentally, Irene is based on Pert Kelton's rendition of Mrs. Paroo, the irish mother of Marion from "The Music Man". She was essentially "born" that way, all the way back in '96 (yep and it's taken me this long to put her into a fic), but it was coincidence that I had Gosalyn refer to Beth as "Marion the Librarian", another "Music Man" reference, in my rewrite of TWC1.

Bug's name was going to be Herbert, until I realized that he is the *third* "Herb" in the Webfoot Weavings, after Herb Muddlefoot and Honker (whose real name is Herbert Jr). So I changed it to Henry, though I struggled with it, because I originally named him after my grandfather - first name Herbert, nicknamed "Bud".

Shout-out to referencing my own fanfics! I have a reference to TWC4 in here, which is the first episode that mentions Beth's fondness for tadpoles. This was something I guess I tossed in when I was punching it up back in '95 or so, and I forgot about it until I reread the early ones a few years ago. The "tadpoles" thing stuck with me and so I tossed it in here as a running gag, even though I never meant it to be an actual character point.

It's hard to write Beth being this miserable and this depressed, because gosh, she's like this through almost the *whole fic*. I'm not 100% sure that she's actually bearable in this story because she's just so depressed. It's hard to write, since it feels so repetitive (though it's repetitive for a reason, which I'll go into in a separate note), so I'd understand if it's hard to read.

This scene with Launchpad and Beth is so awkward. Good lord. It's even worse than I remembered. :D I actually really like the part when he tries to talk to her and she pulls her hand away. Oh, Launchpad. Also? Stupid I know, but the whole coffee thing is still cute. I love writing little moments between them, even when nothing at all happens.

I wanted to try to make sure that I got Beth's feelings as accurate as I can, and so here is some TMI. My husband and I were friends before we started dating (though not really close friends like in this situation), and he liked me before I liked him. He and I talked about it, and I said "just friends" and he said he was okay with that - although it only lasted about a week because I decided to give it a go pretty quickly :) - but for a few days things were SUPER-awkward, especially during the second half of the conversation when, it seemed, he just decided now that it was out there he'd go ahead and tell me everything, and I was like "OMG I have to get OUT OF HERE!" So anyway... Beth's discomfort and guilt are based on that, sort of, only magnified.

Sigh. True confessions: I am very, very uncomfortable writing intimate scenes. That goes for romance in particular. I like to write banter and flirtatious dialogue, I like to write introspection, I like to write silly comedy; now, technically, I like to write romance but I am very bad at it. That's why things move very slowly in my fics and that is why things tend to be very understated. There are moments within this Launchpad/Beth scene, when he's trying to talk to her, where I'm attempting to convey an intimacy between them - the kind of thing that, if you were watching it in a movie, would make you ache for the people involved and also be chanting for them to kiss one another. I honestly have no idea if I was successful or if it just falls flat. I for one feel underwhelmed and I would LOVE some feedback. But yeah, there's a big reason why there's not a lot of solid romance in my fics so far... after fifteen stories. *sigh*

On the flip side, the introspective Launchpad stuff I wrote... well I'm rereading it for the first time in like, two years, and I'm surprised to find that I like it. This stuff works for me.

Heh, random reference to "High, Dry, and Flooded" when LP passes the Muddlefoots' house: they're having their Tuo security system removed (and getting the house repaired while they're at it) after the finale of that fic. ^_^ I know I say a few paragraphs later that it's only 8:30 in the morning, which is a pretty early start time for home cleanup, but I wanted to get that gag in (but I cleverly played it down during such a deep emotional scene, becuz clever writer is clever :P)

Five points for the implication that everyone will think LP and Beth's "night together" was less than innocent!

The discussion between LP and Drake is, for once, more or less in-character (as I see it anyway). LP's mood has precedent since he can, on occasion, take things quite hard and get pretty bummed out (and when LP bums out he *really* bums out). DW of course is just being DW. God love 'im. *hugs DW*

For some reason it struck me as immensely funny that Drake woud misquote his "clever quip" from when he beat the Liquidator in the finale of HD&F. Since it's been a while since I read the original fic, though, now I'm like "WHO is going to notice that he misquoted it?" which makes it look like carelessness for anyone who DOES notice. It was on purpose! I'm totally anal about these details and I swear I wouldn't gloss over 'em... even if everyone else in the world does. XD

Hahaha. Drake is *not* a Beth/LP shipper. He's totally not *trying* to be insensitive though - in fact he's trying very hard to be the other thing, you know, UNinsensitive ;P - I've just found that, a lot of times, people just don't seem to get that the moment you've had your heart broken is NOT the right time to say "well now you can get on with your life!" (For the record, I almost certainly would totally say that to someone in these circumstances, because I am just that insensitive! No, but seriously, it's easy to forget how much it hurts when it's not happening to you.)

You can see, in a few moments of this discussion as well as later in the fic, that I was writing this and rewriting TWC1 at the same time, and I was in fact just redoing Beth's and Drake's first meeting and working on how she fell for Drake in the first place. This shows up in LP's reflection that maybe if Beth hadn't met DW at exactly the time she did, she never would've fallen for him... which is probably true. Or maybe not. But I stuck that in because I was in process of giving the newly specific details of their meeting, and it was suddenly relevant. Stuff like that pops up throughout - this fic, and TWC1, were very symbiotic and influenced each other quite a bit. Which is WEIRD, if you think about it. Parasitic. Incestuous, almost. ;P (No, not at all actually, but I was looking for a good word...)

And next we have my introduction of Beth's father and brother! I had never really fleshed them out much in my mind - aside from physical description I knew (and still know) pretty much nothing about the older brother Bill (aka "Beef"), and at the time of writing I didn't know much about Bug yet, either. I've since discovered that Bug is a loving, but mostly uninvolved father. He's just a bit too passive in the family situation and has never tried to take any stand against his very, very outspoken wife.

One quick addition, I had forgotten that I wrote this scene from Honker's perspective. I'm glad I did that even though it seems weird since I think this is basically his only scene in the fic. Still glad though. I love Honker.

Better Not Be Stingy or Your Nightmares Will Come Truuuue

Well, here they are - the final set of chapter notes for HOAW. For better or worse!

Happy Halloween!

Chapter 10:

References:

- The Real Ghostbusters - "Roben's Spirit Guide", Morgana's reference material, is a take on "Toben's Spirit Guide" from RGB.
- Morgana's backwards-spell to open the door ("Nepo rood") is a reference to Zatanna from DC Comics.

Somehow Morgana watching calmly as candy flies through the air strikes me as funny. I guess because it seems to imply that this is an everyday occurence for her, or at least something she's used to.

I had a real problem in writing this chapter, because I honestly really wanted to have the rain pouring down (SO spooky, you know) but I also needed Gos to be trick-or-treating the whole time. Well, I was always more than willing to go out in the rain on Halloween, but I think I might be pushing it in this one. ;)

Another track from the Beetlejuice soundtrack inspired the tone of this chapter once DW and co. go into Beth's house. All the funhouse stuff is there specifically because the track has funhouse-style music in it. Is that cheating?

Richie was hard to write because he was more or less unsympathetic. Even giving his reasons for doing what he did failed to make him sympathetic. More scenes are written from his POV mostly so that I could try and figure him out a bit. Stella was more straightforward - she made a decision rashly and then regretted it when her spell started to claim Beth, so she decided to cancel it. Richie was harder because he didn't have the regret that Stella had, nor was he inclined to give up his chance at freedom the way she was. Not that I think it was a mistake for me to write him that way, only that it made it harder to find a way to *like* him.

Anyone wondering how, exactly, zombies could burst through the floor of the house's *second story* to attack DW can consider that he's also being attacked by staircases and banisters. *G*


Chapter 11:

References:

- None for this chapter!

Some of the transitions here are jarring; I'd had some constructive criticism when I wrote these scenes that jumping from POV to POV within a scene was poor writing (although the person who told me that was much much kinder in their phrasing *G*) because it implied omniscience. So I was trying very hard to have only one POV per scene, or at least not a whole lot of hyper bounce-arounds. Over time I found that this method of writing didn't work for me, and tried to adapt it so that if I switched POVs in a scene I could at least have a clearer transition to it (which may have been what the commenter actually meant), but at this point it's just choppy little scene changes but with how they're structured I don't want to take the time to reorder them.

Always feel kind of good about myself when I reach the point in a fic where DW gets to be heroic. Since I am at that point in this fic (after 11 chapters!), I now feel good. Also, I liked writing him fighting Malachai, since I feel like it's the most in-character I have DW in this entire fic.

Y'know, rereading this now, I find something very moving about LP's statement that he would never give up trying to save Beth, even when he could no longer see her... I guess that's lame, being enamored with my own writing, but honestly, when it comes to the Beth/LP stuff I am oddly hard to please with my own writing so I thought it was worth noting that I actually *liked* something. (A lot of the other parts in here either leave me cold or even make me cringe a little... I *so* overwrite these things, or else I underwrite them.)

My hope is that Richie's sudden change of heart is a) believable, and b) kind of endearing. I would like it to be one of those moments where you kind of grin a little while reading it. If readers didn't like him up to now, I hope maybe they forgive him a bit at this part.

On the other hand, in retrospect I do wonder if perhaps Richie ends up becoming a bit of Marty Stu, joining Darkwing in fighting Malachai. I had intended it just to give him a purpose for being there, but it does feel to me like it takes away some of DW's thunder, now. Oh well, once again - what's done is done.

Oh yes. I think I failed to mention before now that, rather than sounding the slightest bit like Michael Keaton OR Beetlejuice (lol), the voice in my head for Richie is Steve Buscemi. Very weasely. (I am allowed to say that because, believe it or not, I have the hots for Steve Buscemi, and have for abooooouuuut... five years now? When did I see "Ghost World"? That long, anyway.)

The old "house pulling itself apart" idea came ultimately from The Haunting but I do believe that it's been in a lot of haunted house films.

The brief, quiet conversation between Morgana and Darkwing at the end here is meant to feel very intimate - I sort of wanted to acknowledge a bond between them.

Epilogue

References:
- The Last Unicorn, for Stella's "remembering" tea; the influence here was the laughing skeleton who "remembers" wine enough to get drunk off of it when it's not really there.
- The "going into the light" idea is not specific or unique to one source, but I was thinking explicitly of The Frighteners in this one. Which is kind of odd given how I use it, but oh well. *G*

Although Stella is definitely at peace in the end, I also found something a little chilling about her and Richie simply... *disappearing* like that, and ended up reflecting that in Beth; this is why, despite her sympathy to Stella, Beth is left more unsettled by this ending than anything else.

You may be left wondering if this is for certain the end, or if there are still any ghosts in Beth's house. Well, short answer "yes" with an "if", long answer "no" with a "but..." No, that's a Simpsons quote. The answer is, there are not *currently* any ghosts in Beth's house. If you can call that an answer...

The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living

Chapters 8 and 9 of HOAW; this will be followed by the remaining chapters tomorrow, probably in the morning. I also have a picture to post! Not by me! Which makes it even cooler :D

Chapter 8

References:

- "Calvin and Hobbes", which long ago inspired the "lobotomy" gag of carving pumpkins. It just seemed SO Gosalyn...
- The Wizard of Oz, in multiple ways, most prominently "I do believe in spooks".
- BIG reference to Beetlejuice in Morgana's spell, which is as close to word-for-word from the movie's exorcism scene as I could get it. I actually did not get it right going by ear when I wrote this... I have since checked the closed-captioning and corrected it. Mostly. *sigh*
- And another reference, this one kind of more subtle: Gosalyn is actually describing Beetlejuice when she asks Stella if she can make herself look scary "like in that movie".
- The other movie Gos eagerly mentions is, of course, The Exorcist. That movie scared my sister so much it made her CRY. :D
- Third reference to Beetlejuice in this chapter: The phrase "Death for the dead" in reference to exorcism comes from there.
- "This is my 'resolved face'" is from "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" (it's a Willow line, from season 2 I believe). Cute and, I think, quite Beth-ish.

I don't know but there is something about the sentence "I'll let you carve part of the face" which, as innocently as Gosalyn may mean it, is just sadistic and wrong. :D

I had initially intended Beth's repeated versions of "my house is haunted" to be a reference to "The Real Ghostbusters", where in one episode Winston just disbelievingly repeats "I have sold my soul to the devil" until someone - I think Ray? - points out that it's just a minor demon. (That sure helps, huh? The chant then becomes "I have sold my soul to a minor demon.") ANYway - I felt like it turned out flat on paper, so I just kept the very basic idea.

Beth is too upset and freaked out to be polite or bother to hide the fact that she doesn't like Morgana, here. Naturally no one actually picks up on it. *snerk*

To the best of my knowledge, it really IS dangerous to break a circle during a seance, since the circle is the protection or something. I've never been in a seance. At least not a real one. ;P

So I hope that it doesn't seem out of character for Beth to be so gung-ho all of a sudden about helping Stella. I feel that it's in her character a lot to want to help people, and that she decided that the ghost was just unhappy and needed help, so she'd do it. I know that's kind of a 180-degree turn from her skepticism earlier, but now that the whole thing has a "human face" on it, so to speak, she's much more sympathetic.

One could wonder why, precisely, they're going to let Gos go out Trick-or-Treating when they've got this whole thing planned. The real-life answer is because I needed Gos to be doing something in the climactic scene; the within-the-fic answer is that, if you've heard of fury and a woman scorned, that's nothing compared to the fury of a woman who has missed out on Tricks-or-Treats. (Thank you, "Great Pumpkin"!)

Chapter 9:

References:

- One more Beetlejuice ref for the win, as Richie dusts himself off when he re-enters the story... This is done in the manner of Michael Keaton in the movie, when he says "It's showtime."

OOoooh spooky spooky house! I feel like this opening scene to this chapter is a little overwritten, because it's very much a visual scene in my head and that, naturally, can't be conveyed well into text. Ah well. I do like Gosalyn going back to her window in the hopes that NOW she'll be able to see some ghosts, though.

Drake and Beth's chess game is a lot like the ones I used to play with my husband. For the record, in this game, Drake is me. *G*

"What could happen to her in the hour that she'll be out?" Dun-dun-dunnnnn! Watch me make use of my very subtle foreshadowing! Gape in amazement! ;D

With Beth running around her house calling for Stella, don't you just want to make a "Streetcar Named Desire" reference?

By the time it's turning to dusk and Beth realizes she's been running around her house for three hours, at this point I wanted to imply that the whole reason she went over there (and the whole reason Drake let her) was because the house was sort of working on them both, warping their judgment. I think that's probably clear from how Beth wonders why she lost track of time, etc, but since I spell things out in these notes, consider this one spelled.

The entrance of the ghosts is another sequence written to a track on the Beetlejuice soundtrack - at the moment I couldn't tell you the name of it, though I think it's "The Exorcism" or something, but it's track number 13. Stella's entrance is approximately 52 seconds into the track, which I know because I am listening to it now. *lol*

Okay... what do readers think of Richie's return? Did people know he'd be back? Was it super-obvious that he was a ghost, and was the presence in the wall? I wanted to leave that a mystery until this point and have a little tiny fakeout, implying that the other presence was Malachai trapped in the house. Instead, what Morgana mistakes for two presences is actually three: the woman, the one trapped in the house - Richie - and the "angry" one, which is Malachai. So did it work as a mystery or was it obvious? I genuinely want to know, so please leave a comment if you have one! Even if it's "it was obvious", I still wanna know.

There is no intention of implying a romance between Stella and Richie, btw. Though if anyone wanted to read it that way I wouldn't stop them. But I didn't craft one.

While I'm rereading this now, I am pretty confident I did a decent job of maintaining the surprise with the spell that gets set on Beth. I don't see any major giveaway on that, but if I'm wrong, please do let me know. Sometimes subtleties are not my real strength. ;)

I've seen "The Exorcist" about 2,000 times and it keeps getting funnier EVERY TIME I SEE IT

HOAW Chapter notes continue!

Chapter six

References:

- Henna-Barbeara is my incredibly brilliant reference to Hanna-Barbera. No, seriously, I think that might be the best name-pun I've ever come up with. Sad, really. *G*
- "That Sinking Feeling", just for the Frosty-Os cereal.
- Poltergeist - "This house... is clean!" As delivered by the medium.

Shout-out for finding a way to write Beth waking up in LP's bed! (Hubba-hubba! Hey, I'm rated G.... approximately. ^_~)

They do not show cartoons anywhere on network TV nowadays on Sunday mornings (they barely show any on Saturdays), but when I was a kid... which I will only say was approximately when this show was airing... they did. Usually it was all Scooby Doo and Smurfs and things, and I didn't usually watch them, but obviously SOMEONE did so why not Gos? *G* They also used to do music videos out of cartoon clips, especially at Halloween. I distinctly remember one for "Bad Moon Rising".

Drake's characterization in this scene - most specifically his "voice" - had a lot of help from Darkwingpsycho and LadyJess, both of whom understand him a lot better than I do. ;)

One thing about ghost stories I've never fully understood is the whole "seeing things that aren't there" part. Just because I don't understand it, though, doesn't mean I won't use it - as evidenced by Beth's ability to contact the house's previous owner on his unlisted number. The only problem with this scene is that it doesn't actually give her any new information, other than the fact that the hauntings escalate until Halloween and then die back down on November 2 or so. Which isn't necessary to the plot. Ah well.

The only problem with the Beth's "I'm sorry, Drake" face is that unfortunately, at no point in any of the fics I've written has Beth ever really said "I'm sorry, Drake, but..." Heh, oh well! Once again if I didn't point these things out probably no one would notice. ^_^;;

Chapter seven

References:

- I think the idea of camping out in the living room comes from Poltergeist as well, but it might not. I do know I saw it in a ghost movie.
- Although nothing in it is a direct reference, the ghost sequence in this is influenced in large part by The Blair Witch Project, mostly in terms of the characters' reactions to what is going on. Mainly Beth's reactions, in fact - the gasping, "What was that!?", and so on is based largely on Heather, the girl in that movie. (Of course in the movie it was "what the *bleep* was that?!") Oh yes - and the description of Beth's breath hanging in the air before drifting away is an image that appears (purely by fortune) in BWP, too.
- The Haunting is somewhat directly referenced in that Beth is holding Drake's hand so hard it "felt like she was breaking his fingers" - which is in my favourite scene of that movie.
- The appearance of Stella, and her movements, are based on the movements of the titular ghost in The Lady In White.
- Help!, the Beatles movie, for Drake's line "I take back every bad thing I said about you". I think it's Help! - it might've been Yellow Submarine.

Drake's thought about how he "might as well just marry" Beth - in a *negative* way - was kind of a deliberate nod to what a bad couple they would actually make. *G*

So, this is the chapter where things start getting, and staying, genuinely creepy. Actually this is probably the creepiest chapter in the story, at least in my opinion. I probably ripped about half of it off from other sources, without knowing it. Oh well. It's all collective memory anyway, right? ;P

Case in point: the sequence where LP hears what he thinks is Beth come into the room and stand behind him. That's the kind of thing that gets me each time.

In addition to a nod to The Blair Witch Project and the specific reference to The Haunting, as noted above, this whole sequence with the appearance of the ghost owes some inspiration to The Haunting in general, which is sublime in its use of tension and fear in the middle of the night. The presence of barely-heard voices also is drawn from that film, mainly a scene in which Nell hears the voice of a man chanting or reciting something - you can hear his voice, but can't make out a single word, which is very creepy. There's also a woman laughing or maybe crying, and a baby crying... Unsettling scene, just wonderful. *fangirls The Haunting for like the fiftieth time*

I have always wondered about how this reads to other people reading it for the first time. Anyone reading, or who has already read it: what's your impression of this scene? What do people make of the shape that goes running down the hallway? Does this inspire curiosity to know what's going on or is it just "ho hum, ghosts again"?

Who else thinks LP is milkin' the whole being-scared thing so that he can keep clinging to Beth? ;) Heh, in fact, I like that idea so much that I just went back and attributed it to Drake. Your call whether or not it's true...

You can't reason with a headless man!

The past four post titles, btw, are from the Disney version of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, narrated (and in this case, sung) by Bing Crosby. Man I wanna watch that now!

***

Chapter four

References:

- "Monsters R Us", the Darkwing episode, referenced a few times over mostly for Gos having been the Monster and somewhat for LP having been the vampire bat. Evidently Beth has not seen that episode. ;)
- The Seven-Year Itch starring Marilyn Monroe, which is the inspiration for Beth's costume (as she says).
- "Malice's Restaurant", I think, was the Darkwing episode where Morgana meets the Muddlefoots. I always thought it was interesting because it brings Morg into Drake's life, outside of his nightlife as Darkwing. Also because of how quickly the Muddlefoots and Morgana take to each other. *G*

Joke that may be lost: the Super Glue to get the bolts on. One should never Super Glue anything to one's body. I'd intended to refer to the bolts being there later (possibly the next day) but decided it was out of place.

I feel a cardinal rule of writing a ghost story is, even when you have cute scenes, you must keep the tension up a little by including some spooky stuff. Hence the part with the locked/unlocked door at Beth's house.

This is another chapter with a bit of a change to it, mainly with LP in Beth's house; I made him a little more exasperated with her behaviour. 'Cause no matter how much you like someone, when they're frustrating they're just FRUSTRATING, durnit. *G*

Another thing I tweaked was just referencing the fact that Beth knows how LP feels about her now, and is nervous being complimented by him (though underneath she's also quite flattered, as well).

Don't ask me why I "duck-i-fied" Charles Darwin's name to "Drakewin" but did not change Marilyn Monroe or Humphrey Bogart. I just couldn't think of any good replacement names. Drakewin, on the other hand, fit so nicely... SO nicely, in fact, that I'm certain either DWD or DuckTales already used it somewhere. The image of Honker in that costume is SO CUTE in my head! ^_~

The brief Honker and Beth interaction sorta sets up something I started playing with back in "Something In the Air", which is that Beth and Honker think very similarly and as such get along very well - which down the road leads to Honker developing a little crush on her. I think this is different from the "everyone loves Beth" syndrome I used to have, because it actually makes *sense*, and also because I intend to underplay it and use it mainly to annoy Gosalyn. If I ever manage to write a fic that takes place after this one, it'll become a little more obvious. ^_^

One thing that is in use in this fic which I don't think has been made particularly clear in earlier fics is that Beth really *is* pretty, and despite being incredibly skinny, could possibly pull off something like Marilyn Monroe for her costume. It's made a little more evident in AAE. The issue she has is that she's been overshadowed by her glam older sister and had self-esteem issues, so she's never put any effort or developed any confidence into her appearance, and manages to keep people from *looking* at her closely enough to notice that she's quite good-looking. She really is underweight, though - or at least, she was, but she's no longer as bad as she was before she met Launchpad. Once she got more friends, she started eating a little better and is a healthier weight now; so she's still skinny - that's just her body type, tall and thin - but no longer badly so.

I put Morgana in a black dress (kind of a Morticia Addams deal) because I figure Halloween is for her family what Christmas is for a lot of Normals (at least the Christian ones), so she's dressed up after having just left some family affair. Oddly, though, I always put her in black when she clearly prefers the colour red in the series. Well, blame me for liking black, I guess.

Yes, "thrilled to death" to see Morgana is an intentional pun on my part.

LP does indeed do a Bogart impression, I believe in "Double-O Duck" from DuckTales.

Man, I really wanted him to kiss her. *sigh* How come, no matter how many times I reread that scene, he never does? :P

Chapter Five

References:

- None in this chapter!

More additions to the text here, both to acknowledge the changes to canon and to give a little more depth to Beth's freakout. In the original she was freaking out more because she was just afraid she was going to ruin her friendship by falling for LP or something, the way she had with Drake; but it makes more sense for her to freak out because LP is moving in on her and she doesn't know how to deal with it. Of course she blames herself though. *G* And actually, she's sort of right - she is sending pretty mixed messages...

I don't think it comes across too well here but that wall section that keeps worrying at Beth - what makes it so uncomfortable is that it's body temperature, perhaps a little damp, and tends to remind people of touching human skin. :P

Of course the "audio" portion of this ghost scene corresponds to the prologue. I tellya folks if this had been a movie and not a fanfic, this scene would have been positively spine-chilling.

Personal opinion, on rereading this, is that you can tell I was out of practice writing DW when he comes into this chapter... A better representation of him would be to have him say something to make it worse, or something like that. I was writing DW like he had no sense of humour here. If I weren't so lazy I'd rewrite it a little, but eh... ;)

Wow, a short chapter!

So don't try to figure out a plan

Okay, so I missed Monday for chapter notes. Therefore I will be making two posts tonight (Tuesday). Chapters 2 and 3 in this one...

***

Chapter two:

References:

- Bernie Wrightson, the previous owner of the house, is named for the acclaimed comic book artist of the same name. I named him that as a gag in TWC4, but it really fits here; he has a strong background in horror comics. :D
-Friends: Beth's attempts to be "breezy" are a direct reference to an ep of this series when Monica leaves a message on her ex-boyfriend's machine. She tells the others that she was "breezy", but it turns out that she ended the message by awkwardly saying "I'm breezy!"
- A Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday The 13th, two giants of the slasher genre, got blended together for Nightmare on 13th Street. Obvious, but a fun nod anyway.

Beth's fear of spiders was established in "The Bride Wore Black". Of course it's just one of many creepy-crawlies she has a problem with...

Additions to this chapter from the original version mainly include details about the shrink Beth is seeing in St. Canard - naming her and linking her to the previous story (referral from Dr. Mortimer). Dr. Mortimer's office is about two hours away; too much of a commute. *G*

Beth's awkwardness about hugging LP is actually more a holdover from the first version of the fic, when she was clueless about how he felt about her. I probably should rewrite it now but I'm not sure how to, and it's not all that important anyway.

Re: Beth's inability to find anything on TV that is not horror... Back in the early 90s, when this fic takes place, it seemed like all through the second half of October you would only find slasher movies on TV, especially on "local" stations like the now-defunct UPN and on cable movie channels. Nowadays no one really cares, but I distinctly remember the old days when if you wanted to watch a slasher flick in late October, you could just pick a channel at random.

The Casablanca bit is another reference to something with Kim McFarland, this one an RP series in a forum waaay back in, like, 1994 or something. I have injokes no one gets anymore! It's okay, though, because Beth likes old movies and LP is a Bogart fan, so it works. ^_~

For the record, Drake insisted on coming over because he felt bad about how his conversation with Beth went and he's too awkward about it to just apologize. This is his effort at making it up to her by showing her that he still likes her; Beth totally does not pick up on this.

I'm never sure it's appropriate to have LP come off so cowardly when it comes to supernatural stuff. I get the impression from DWD episodes that he doesn't really like gorey movies, he was pretty uneasy in "The Haunting of Mr. Banana Brain", and Morgana and her family seem to make him nervous; I may be playing it up a bit much though. I can't decide. I think there's a precedent in the series that I'm following... I hope so anyway.

One may wonder why Darkwing is put off when Beth asks him to come over and catch burglars... The answer is because it's not something he's likely to get a TV special out of, essentially. ;) He does think she's probably overreacting to a noise or a shadow, but even if it turned out to be a burglar, it's a small fry and Darkwing is more interested in catching someone really big and getting national media coverage for it.

On a personal note, in every ghost movie I've ever seen, unseen running footsteps scare the living bejesus out of me like almost nothing else. There was this part in The Grudge where - um.... that's neither here nor there, forget about it. (I spent half of that movie with my hands over my eyes. LITERALLY. HALF.)

Chapter three

References:

- Stella D'Oro cookies - the inspiration for Stella's last name. I named Stella and Richie in the prologue well before I realized I needed last names for them. D'Oro was a cute gag and also the first name that came into my head.
- Toronto Sun - where I got the name for the St. Canard Sun. The Toronto Sun is, heh, a bit of a rag publication (IMHO). Consider the St. Canard edition to be much the same.
- Stephen King's "IT"; Casper the Friendly Ghost - the two inspirations for Richie's last name. Kaspar/Casper is obvious; it's also similar to Kasprak, the last name of a second character in "IT".
-Quackenbos - I will continue to take any opportunity I can find to work this name into one of my fics.

I just realized that I've got two consecutive chapters in which Beth wanders into the Mallard household and convinces someone there to hang out with her. Heh.

Yay for Beth-Is-A-Geek jokes! I wrote the stuff about Beth at the library loooong before I thought up her childhood love affair with libraries (detailed in AAE), but it only makes sense,don't you think? Incidentally, Gosalyn shares my study habits.

I am pretty certain I stole the gag about Beth's delight over periodicals from The Simpsons. You know, since I steal everything else from that show. ;D

Who remembers card catalogs anymore?

If you cue it right around the point where Beth says "This is a Halloween edition from 1971", more or less anyway, track 6 on the Beetlejuice soundtrack ("Lydia Discovers?") goes right around here.

Incidentally, I shouldn't even point this out on the chance that people might not notice it if I don't, but I'm aware there's a plot hole here: how could anyone know that Stella disappeared from her home that day exactly? Well, we could always assume that she had family or something coming over the next day and she wasn't there... But even THEN how would they know about Richie? Let's just assume there's some unlikely but possible explanation and go with that, huh?

Notes for next two chapters follow immediately! To the point where you will actually see this particular entry after them, because yay for loading backwards. ^_~

He's out looking for a top to chop

Chapter notes for "The House On Avian Way" start right now! Today we get the prologue, and chapter 1.

Prologue:

References, etc:

- "Beetlejuice" in various forms is referenced throughout this fic, since both the film and (to a much larger extent) the soundtrack were a huge inspiration. In fact, as mentioned, a lot of the fic was written to the soundtrack. The film, soundtrack, and animated series are referenced many times.

The entire scene is written, and (more or less) paced, to the opening title theme from the "Beetlejuice" soundtrack. If you listen to the theme while reading this scene - well, it won't match up perfectly because the scene doesn't take a minute and a half, or however long the track is, to read; however, it's meant to approximately follow the sequence.

As we find out later, this scene takes place in 1951 - not that I have anything to link it to that year beyond a few vague hints: "the modern wing-tipped shoes" in Richie's apparel being the biggest one. Also, their names - Stella and Richie - are names I associate more closely with the 50s. Though I think "Richie" is linked to the 50s for me more because of Stephen King's "IT" than any real popularity of the name at that time.

Richie's manner of speaking, also, deliberately emulates Beetlejuice in the animated series.

Chapter 1:

References, etc:

- No references in this chapter!

I'm lame. I totally like the juxtaposition of everything going dark and then the room being flooded with light. I'm not sure how clear it is, however, that this is the same room.

So, here we follow the proper format for a ghost story/movie: start with a mysterious, scary or at least chilling sequence to get everyone's attention, then drop down to a quiet and slower-paced opening with a few hints of spookiness thrown in. Mwahahahaha! I love you, ghost stories!

This is probably the first fic that really brings up the fact that Beth is a skilled seamstress, although I established it back in "The Bride Wore Black" (honest!). It also comes up more in "All About Elizabeth", that never-ending monster of a fic. (Almost wish I'd never even started that one by now because it will NEVER BE FINISHED!).

Don't actually know where LP-as-handyman came from; he's a mechanic, not an electrician. [Edited later to add: Actually he's not even a mechanic! XD He's a pilot, but regardless, he clearly has a working knowledge of mechanics - so I can call that canon.] But we can always chalk it up to him trying to impress Beth with his manly knowledge of... everything that can be fixed with a toolbox.

Note my subtle attempts to timeline, when I mention that last year at Halloween Beth had not yet moved in. TWC4 takes place in October and TWC5, in November.

I am not sure, but I think this scene between LP and Beth owes some minor details to Kim McFarland; early in our correspondance when I was writing the first drafts of TWC, she said something about how she could just see LP helping Beth moving furniture and her serving him lemonade, etc... It seems to have resurfaced as LP moving stacks of fabric and Beth serving him iced tea. *g*

Okay, the lengthy introspective part from LP about Beth took a lot of rewriting from me. As of now I still haven't written the ending of AAE, and although I know how it will end, it's hard to reference something you haven't written yet without being either too vague (so no one knows what you're referring to) or too blatant (so there's no point in writing the actual scene you're referencing). I hope I struck a good balance, mainly talking about things that will not be within AAE itself but come in between that one and this one.

Of course the downside in putting all this out now is that it's total spoilers for the ending of AAE, if that kind of thing matters. But it's the getting there that's important, right? ...Right?

Trying to write a dream sucks. I have never been satisfied with what I've managed, and that goes for this one too.

That covers it for this time... tune in next ... uh, day. ^_^

With a hip, hip and a clippety-clop

Every year in October I say to myself "I am going to finish that update on 'The House on Avian Way' so that I can repost it." And then I don't. Well this year guess what? I did! I also put together a buttload of chapter notes for it, which I will be posting anon! (Probably starting tomorrow.) It is not yet uploaded, either at ff.net (the version there is still the old one) or on my webpage, but it will be soon.

Meanwhile though, I thought that in preparation I would post a sort of history of the fic.

I am, as anyone who knows me personally can attest, a freak about Halloween. I've had to grow out of it in recent years, due to lack of time, but in the past I would decorate not only my house but my webpage and blog, as well. I always wanted to write a ghost fic for the Webfoot Weavings, but for years I had no good ideas. In the late 90s, when I was going to school in Canada, two things converged to make inspiration strike:

First of all, I was reading a Rescue Rangers fic with ghosts in it. I found a lot of it to be genuinely chilling, but was let down by the ending. What I liked about the first part, however, was enough to get me thinking of how *I* would write a ghost story; and secondly, I bought the soundtrack for Beetlejuice, written by Danny Elfman. The music in that movie is very original, at once spooky and cartoony, to fit the tone of the movie. I used to listen to the CD in my car while driving to and from school, and after a while, with this possible ghost story on my mind, the score started to inspire scenes.

To be honest, I don't remember what the initial storyline was, except that in the barest bones kind of way it was what it is now: Beth's house is haunted and the characters have to solve the mystery of just WHO is haunting it. or what, or whatever. :) Over the next couple of years I kept going back to the idea, and in 2000, I started writing it. I then spent the next five years working on it. :D

The title was originally meant to be a place-holder, but after a while I discovered it fit nicely. I think this might have been one of the first fics I worked on where I wrote out of order; I kept finding that I couldn't figure out precisely where to go from one spot, so I'd move on to a later one. Also, this was the first *fic* I wrote out of order; I had previously completed "Something In the Air" but had at least one more to go, possibly two, before this one was to take place. I knew, obviously, what was going to happen in those two (or I thought I did) but had no idea when they would be written.

I think I had about half of it, maybe even more, finished by the time I got married in 2002. I didn't want to release it without having it beta read, so I had to track down some readers - my friends Jess and Amanda were absolutely ESSENTIAL in the completion of this story, and in fact, it's more or less how Amanda and I got to be friends and not just general DWD acquaintances. :D

It still took forever and a day for me to finish this thing off. The ending was impossible to write. I wasn't sure just how I wanted it to go until I got there. And so finally in 2005 it was not just finished but beta'd, corrected, and I finally posted it on FF.net, where it fell a bit flat. Heh. ^_^;; In the next few years I actually finished one of the stories to come before it - "High, Dry, and Flooded" - and despite having had that in my head for *years* already the ending took a direction I hadn't expected and I ended up invalidating a good portion of what I'd written and released in HoAW. Figures. So this is why I had to go back and update it. And I held off because I felt like, why do that before I have the one in between HD&F and HoAW finished? (That one is "All About Elizabeth") I might just invalidate it again!

Well, I have gone long enough without updating it. I hate having it just sit there all defunct and all. So I'm finally posting the durn thing.

Of course, now it has spoilers in it, because it takes place after the story I'm currently working on and it does talk about the end of that story. This time I am pretty certain that story will end the way I think it will, btw. ^_~ But heck, if you've come this far, you probably don't mind. :D

HoAW has influence in a lot of my favourite books and movies, *most* of them about ghosts: The Haunting is a HUGE influence, as is Beetlejuice (of course) and even The Blair Witch Project to an extent. Quite a few others are in there too, as noted in the chapter notes to come. I did not include a soundtrack listing, but I might in the next week if I have the time to go through and match up the tracks.

Not a lot of the story has changed, and the really "important" parts are all the same, but still I hope those who choose to will enjoy rereading "The House On Avian Way" as much as I enjoyed writing it. How corny is that? ^_^

Penultimate Authors Notes

Bum-bum-bummmmmm!

There will be only one chapter after this one. I actually have a deleted scene that would have gone in the previous chapter and I was going to post it and forgot, I also forgot to reference it in the notes. I can go back and edit them though, I guess, can't I? Shall do. Perhaps post the scene in question next week. Meanwhile: TWC1, Act 3, Scene 1!

***

References, etc:

- "Yoink." "Yoink?!" comes directly from "The Simpsons", which I find I cannot keep from quoting constantly in my day-to-day life, so it's not only in my fics that it pops up all the time.
- It's not clear, but if you have seen "Reboot", the way DW says "Megavolt." at the beginning of this chapter should be read in exactly the same way that Bob says "Megabyte." in that show. I have been wanting to make that reference for YEARS.
- Obviously this chapter refers heavily to "Clash Reunion" for all the reunion stuff.

I made up my mind that I wanted to write Megavolt mostly congenial in this scene. It seemed really funny to me. In particular once I got on the idea that he would be all "OMG DRAKE HIIII!" the idea cracked me up completely.

"You remember that guy Hamm? I've been wanting to catch up with *him* for a while now." For some reason I love this. ;D

The "where've you been all night?" "Um, at home asleep?" exchange between Megs and Beth was suggested during prereading of the very first draft of this fic, waaaaay back in 1995 I think it was, by Kim McFarland. She made a huge lot of other suggestions too and was very very kind to me over what was really, fundamentally, a pretty mediocre fic. I probably would have given up fanfic writing if not for her encouragement, so I owe her a LOT.

It's not exactly a reference, since it's not a direct line, but Megavolt's list of all the places he tried to track Beth down is inspired by a very similar bit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, recited by Roger after he tried to find Eddie Valiant. Of course in that one it was "But the liquor store guy... *he* knew." Heh.

In a crisis, I tend to go back and forth between having Gosalyn be very brave and proactive, and having her back off nervously. I think that's what she tends to do on the show, too, but I may overdo it (I like to have DW be the one who actually does the heroics, so Gos often just gets rescued); I interpret it as Gos getting all fired-up and going off without thinking, then realizing just how much danger she's in and not being able to think of a way out, so kind of fizzling a bit. If she WERE left to her own devices, for long enough, she'd probably get spitfirey again.

I had a lot of comments about how Drake is really, really hard on Beth here and perhaps too hard. ...I think I stand by how he speaks to her. Keep in mind that not only did she bring Megavolt there - even by accident - it was also due to her presence that he couldn't save Gosalyn right away. He needs a scapegoat and she's it. And yeah, he is mean, but I've seen him get pretty PO'd, even with people he DOES like. (He's said some pretty awful things to Gos and LP, not to mention Morgana.)

The triumphant return

So it took me a year. But I'm back with more chapter notes! And now you can do what I did, and reread all the older posts! ;D

So I left off at the end of Act II, and thus I finish the act up with Chapter 3. I am actually working on this fic again - though it is slow-going due to new family member - and I'm on the final chapter. I'm not going to say something like "I'm hoping to have it done by such-and-such date" or even just "soon" because I have no idea when I will be able to finish it. But I'm working on it anyway! In the meantime, here are the notes for Chapter 3 of Act II.

These are a lot shorter than the previous ones, mostly because a lot of what I could say here - character motivation, etc - I have already gone into. So enjoy! If I am able I'd like to try to update this blog once a week from here on out, but this is early, so we all know better than to expect any consistency from me. ^_~

References, etc:

- "The Simpsons" - Gosalyn's line about "getting reacquainted with my old friend television" comes from the show's "Rear Window" parody, after Bart breaks his leg and is confined to his room all summer long.
- "Moonlighting" - "Do birds bird? Do bees bee?", which is such a ridiculous line that I had to write it in. It also may be one of the only things David Addison has ever said that could be transferred to Gosalyn. XD
- The Music Man - Marion the Librarian
- Addams Family Values - This is where the line that serial killers "look just like everyone else" comes from.

There is a deleted scene to this chapter, believe it or don't. I write way too freaking much (duh) but although you can't tell, sometimes I actually DO read over what I've written and taken stuff out. I wrote a scene about Beth getting ready to go to see Drake, but although I liked it, it added nothing to the plot so I took it out. I'll post it here. SPECIAL BONUS CONTENT.

I don't know when "teacher's days" actually occur in the school year these days. I seem to remember them falling in September. Maybe I'm thinking of Back To School nights. :P Also I don't think they're called Teachers' Days but meh.

Is there even such a thing as truant officers now? Have they existed since, like, the 50s? :D I have a feeling not, but I like the thought that Gosalyn thinks they do since maybe she saw the idea on TV (like I did) and believes they're still around. *G*

The stuff with Gosalyn shouting is the clearest example I have of myself fleshing out what I had previously written, using the first as an outline. I think in that one Beth was, like, surprised by Gosalyn's lung power or something. You can almost use that as a stage direction. *lol* I decided to leave in the "and she's cute!" line, after some debate, justifying it by implying that Gosalyn may well be lying just to get Drake to come downstairs.

I thought it would be really hard to pull off, but in the end, I *like* seeing Beth through Gosalyn's POV in this scene. I think she's really in character, and Gos's take on her seems about what I would expect; she doesn't dislike her, she just has no real interest in her at all and finds her a little odd.

Also, I needed some kind of reason why Beth would want to babysit and why Gosalyn would put up with it, so the idea that she gets along decently with kids actually fits her character. She's intimidated by other adults, but relates okay to children.

Just in case you read between the lines and were wondering if you read it properly... well... if you kind of got the sense that Beth jumps to the conclusion that Drake and Launchpad are living together because they're... *living together*... yeah, I wrote that intentionally. Because honestly, as an adult, I couldn't think of a way that she wouldn't reach that conclusion. Meanwhile I had a bear of a time coming up with a way for her to be reassured it was NOT the case, since I also can't see any circumstance in which either Drake or LP would ever, EVER realize that someone would think that about them. *lol*

Launchpad's "I just crash here" line is pun intended, on my part that is. Not from him. Then again maybe "crash" is just naturally in his vocabulary. ^_~

I don't know where the "herding" trick Drake uses on Beth came from. It just seems to make sense - Beth wants to make sure she's not in anyone's way, so she naturally moves when they seem to be walking in her direction so that she's not blocking their path, or something.

Tiny bit of foreshadowing, I suppose, with Drake being surprised by how Beth can actually be useful. If circumstances had gone differently he would have revised his opinion of her by the end of this meeting; so naturally I had to make things harder on her and shove Megavolt into it so that he'd have an excuse to go on disliking her. Wheee! Character torture! :D

My favourite Gosalyn line in this fic is "I'm saving it all up for med school." (Is it egotistical to have a favourite line?)

I don't know why, but when it comes to writing Drake and Gosalyn there is nothing I like as much as writing their back-and-forths about something Gos has done. It's just FUN. :D


Aaaand that covers another chapter! And it only took me a year! Holy moley!

Sloggin' through the chapter notes...

Here's chapter two of act II, still on TWC1. I'm at least catching up to as much of it as I have written, now... :)

References etc:

-"The Simpsons" - "Boy, would my face have been red!" That's one of Homer's lines, see, so there's a Dan Castellaneta reference too! *G* I believe it's from "Homer's Enemy".
-Ummm... this chapter is essentially a continuation of the previous one, so... there's not really much else. :P

Oh, I really do love that grappling hook gag ^_^

Heh. I kind of like the way I play the Beth/LP stuff here. It's like one big sleight of hand trick, where first LP is focused on Beth... why? Because he wuvs her? Oh, uh, no, it's because she keeps asking about DW and LP isn't sure how to divert her attention. Then there's the entire rationalization about how he's NOT interested in her. I think I have sort of discovered a small handful of new readership with this rewrite, and they may actually NOT realize that the tide turns to LP/Beth. It's just been so taken for granted for so long that I'm enjoying it a little this way, not in a "mwahaha, I'm messing with heads!" way, but I quite like the idea that I can maybe have new fans who will enjoy the new, more gradual set-up I have planned, without knowing what's coming. :) Boy, that note got away from me! This was supposed to just say, simply, I just realized I'm kinda faking people out but perhaps with too much protestation. *G*

Not really sure how, precisely, this whole "social work" idea as an excuse for Drake's "actual" work came about. Nor am I sure how convincing it is, but it doesn't have to last much longer. ;)

I came up with the taxi stuff one day while walking from my car to my office (I park about a block away). I liked it, and rereading what I wrote now, I still like it. How much of it is because LP is a gentleman, and how much of it is because it's Beth, I'm not sure. We'll just have the lines blurred, I suppose.

Another similarity between myself and Beth: I cannot bear to let people give me money for something spontaneously. It makes me VERY uncomfortable.

"That's enough outta you, you big bully!" is *almost* a reference, since I'm kind of going back to Dead Duck in terms of Launchpad's inability to improvise dramatic dialogue on an appropriate scale. ("You'll never work in this town again!") The "big bully" part is probably proof he should've stopped. ;)

I always liked Megs stepping over the side of the roof in the original. I like how I rewrote it even more, though. "An interesting, yet brief, sound". Heh. The best part is, Dan Castellaneta has such a great repertoire of interesting sounds, I can dream he'd do that description justice. ^_^

The "recovery" of Darkwing is one of those moments that just fits better into a cartoon - I tried to shy away from "physical gags" and such in fanfic, since they don't translate well, but it's the kind of show Darkwing is so I can't quite avoid 'em completely. On the other hand, this is mild enough that it can be described reasonably well. It's just so hard to get cartoony visual gags into words - I'm sure most authors know just what I'm talking about, and most avoid them for the very same reason.

I don't think Darkwing's "Not awake?" line works. Sigh. I had trouble thinking of something and that doesn't quite fit as well as I'd hoped.

How obvious is it that Beth calls Drake by his full name, all the time, even in her head? It's like Jordan Catalano!

Poke at myself, for sticking Megs on a bunch of rooftops this time around for some reason. I think he spends like half the fic on a rooftop somewhere or other, and there are about three or four of them. I realized this was excessive, but had no better ideas (and I DID think - figuring out the timing and placement of, for instance, Beth's trip home and Megavolt's decision to try to follow her, took a while) so I just made fun of myself a bit. *G*

There's another joke that I felt was kinda nicely subtle as Megs counts the bolts again: his certainty that the bolts have multiplied, as if the number is in flux, and he might now have not only one extra but several.

The end!

Read Along With Zebbie!

I need to create a new tag, now that I have that nifty title. Yeesh, just... I am lame. :P Anyway though.

Act II begins with my second big Megavolt scene. This is actually sorta proof of how clueless I am when writing Megavolt. I get very, very lost because I don't have an internal Megs "voice" - I think I actually had more of one in high school, believe it or not - so I tend to just write in silliness and do a slightly stream-of-consciousness kind of bit. Stream-of-consciousness usually works for Megs. I also do enjoy throwing in really ridiculous phrases, like "extremely beautiful lady pigeons".

So that's our starting point. References for this chapter:
- "Not once; not twice; but thrice" - the Simpsons, an early episode with the Nuclear Plant softball ringers. Ahhh, Burns.

- "All he could do was stare at them, the bolts, his albatross" - Rime of the Ancient Mariner, in a really stupid I've-Never-Actually-Read-It kind of way. The reference is that the bolts are the albatross around his neck... and... verrrrry few people probably needed that explained. SIGH.

- Brief and totally not-clever reference to "Clash Reunion" since Beth thinks Megs's name is "Megawatt". SHE is not the one referencing the ep. I am because I stuck it in there for fans so they would think I was clever.

Nothin' much else. Unless you count referencing my earlier draft of this fic as a reference; I brought back the pigeon bit. Kind of. :) I don't know where the pigeon bit came from in the OV; I just thought it was funny. I made so much out of it, though, that when I was rewriting I felt it had to show up again. It's like an homage. ;P I actually didn't know quite how to fit it in there, either.

By the way, as of the writing of that scene I still am not at all sure what Megavolt is DOING. (I know now. Honest, I do.) Shhhh! Don't tell anyone! It's such sloppy writing!

"Poor pigeon" - as you can see, I couldn't bring myself to actually kill the dumb bird. Though, I leave it up to the reader to guess if the pigeon DW and LP see fly away is actually the same one Megs refers to in his POV scene. If so, it's not a pigeon that learns very quickly.

The "stealth" stuff is not a reference to anything. But I thought it was very, very funny... inside my head. Not sure it works quite as well if you're not me. But that's your loss. ^_^ Oh, and I couldn't resist an opportunity to take a potshot at one of my least favourite words of all time: "healthful". GUESS WHAT, THE WORD YOU WANT TO USE IS "HEALTHY" SO :P :P :P (Yes. I am in 8th grade.)

Please, please, please don't let me be the only person who thinks it's funny that Megavolt would mistake a grappling hook for a robotic spider, and take a liking to it. PLEASE.

And here we get to Beth's narrative, explaining - at least in part - why she fell for him. I kind of did that in my notes last time, but here's a version within the fic that I like a li'l bit better. Yay, good for me! Of course it's me being in love with words again. ;D Anyway, this topic will show up again in later fics, naturally, because Beth ruminates. But this gives us the gist. Also, right now she's really only sort of taken with him and intrigued by him; the real crush part will come a tiny bit later (though really, by the end of the fic, she's pretty gone).

The Launchpad and Beth sequence - the one that is within this chapter - was hard for me to write. Often when I write them they kind of ramble and have trouble getting to the point (probably because Beth has that trouble, and unlike my lack of a Megavolt voice, the Beth voice in my head is very very strong and likes to take over conversations), and this was no exception. I had a direction I wanted the conversation to go in, and moreover I had a direction I wanted the POV to go in; getting it there was hard. There seem to be a lot of things Beth doesn't want to directly address. :P

That's all for now! Lala! I thought I might get to chapter 2 tonight, but it's late and me want sleep. More later though - honest this time!